Blogs » Society » Christmas flashmob confession succeeds in getting the girl

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• Christmas flashmob confession succeeds in getting the girl
• 8Asians Interviews Keni Styles, Asian American Male Porn Star
• Corruption crackdown leading to... real estate boom?
• Presented By:
• Photos: Xi Jinping propaganda makes him look normal, handsome
• Return of the China Blog
• If You’re In China And Haven’t Been Tweeted At By @chinesetutorbei Yet, Don’t Worry: You Will Be
• Friday Night Musical Outro: Twinkle Star – The End of the New Beginning
• The Beijing Ducks Held Their Opponent Without A Field Goal In The Fourth Quarter Tonight
• The China MOU (Memorandum of Understanding). Use Them At YOUR Peril.
• Friday Links: New subway openings, flattening mountains (hills) again, and pandas playing in the snow
• China’s ten biggest criminal cases of 2012
• Oops! Woman Accidentally Has Sex With Boyfriend’s Twin, Becomes Pregnant
• Fish auctioned off for 340,000 RMB
• Henan official sacked for criticizing tomb demolition campaign
• A Chinese Version Of “Cats” Is Currently Playing In Beijing. Whoa
• Choir Bar: Bund-side Single Malts
• New Internet regulations may require real-name registration to service providers
• Here Are The Winners Of Global Times’s Tongue Twister Contest
• Shanghaiist Year in Review: Most popular posts of 2012

Christmas flashmob confession succeeds in getting the girl Posted: 28 Dec 2012 07:00 PM PST On Christmas night, the dormitory balconies of Guangdong Teachers College of Foreign Language and Arts (GTCFLA) were spilling over with jealous girls watching the flashmob confession of one male student to his (older) female classmate. [ more › ]

8Asians Interviews Keni Styles, Asian American Male Porn Star Posted: 28 Dec 2012 07:37 PM PST 8Asians recently scored an interview with Keni Styles, described as "one of the first heterosexual Asian male porn stars in America." It's funny for answers such as this: The likes of Rick Lee and Hung Low and the legend of Dick Ho were all present before me, as well as loads of popular Asian guys in the gay scene. And advice that's so, so cliched: Self-belief is the key to everything that IS, in your reality. Whatever life you live and goals you aspire to, achieving them simply lies within, in your commitment to your own self-belief. But overall, it's down-to-earth and sensible, with answers you could Hmmm to: I went from earning big bucks and flying the Asian flag let's say, to barely surviving below the poverty line on a long and drawn out battle to simply be accepted by your government. Through self-belief, good standing and I dunno just sheer blind hope… I finally got in. Styles could be your average groundbreaking Asian American in any industry, it feels. But he's a porn star, and he has a website that is utterly NSFW, so it all seems fresh. Check him out in porn sites that are not blocked in China such as PornHub. 8Questions: Keni Styles, Asian American Male Adult Film Star (8Asians)

Corruption crackdown leading to... real estate boom? Posted: 28 Dec 2012 06:00 PM PST Despite recent headlines to the contrary, it looks as though China may soon be taking corruption seriously. In what could be a sign of things to come, the provinces of Guangdong and Jiangsu have been hit with an influx of apartments for sale government officials nervous about an impending crackdown attempt to dump their suspect properties. [ more › ]

Presented By: Posted: 28 Dec 2012 06:00 PM PST

Photos: Xi Jinping propaganda makes him look normal, handsome Posted: 28 Dec 2012 05:00 PM PST                       Recently Xinhua has published a lot of photos, now making their way around the Chinese web and weibo, to emphasize their more human side. Old photos, personal snapshots and publicity photos of the officials doing good deeds are meant to encourage public support for the new leaderships era of change. [ more › ]

Return of the China Blog Posted: 27 Dec 2012 05:00 PM PST All of you Sinica old-timers might remember a show we ran two years ago on the death of the China blog, in which Jeremy, Kaiser and Will Moss mused about whether the combined forces of Twitter, Facebook and Bill Bishop would manage to drive a stake through the heart of independent China blogging. So how refreshing is it to find that despite the growth of these online collossi, we still find ourselves reading and recommending blog posts from China hands old and new. How has the China blog scene changed in the last two years? If you're curious about the state of affairs too, join Kaiser Kuo and Jeremy Goldkorn in our studio today as we are delighted to host two of the younger and more influential bloggers writing on China today: Eric Fish from the Economic Observer who gravitates to more analytic pieces at Sinostand, and Anthony Tao from Beijing Cream, who specializes in shorter posts and high-quality snark on Chinese popular culture. Enjoy the Sinica show? Let us take a break from pushing our RSS feed today to remind you that we want this show to be a two-way street. So if you have any recommendations for show topics you'd like to hear us cover, or guests you think would make for great listening, please let us know. Suggestions are more than welcome in our comment section, and please consider yourself welcome to fire an email to us for private consumption at sinica@popupchinese.com. Oh yes, and lest we forget, you can download this show as a standalone mp3 file if the player isn't exactly your thing. Cheers! This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now

If You’re In China And Haven’t Been Tweeted At By @chinesetutorbei Yet, Don’t Worry: You Will Be Posted: 28 Dec 2012 09:00 AM PST If you write about China, are slightly Asian, live here, or have generally anything to do with this country, there's a decent chance you know Mesi Chinese, a.k.a. @chinesetutorbei. That's because she — it — has been on a one-person rampage to find out whether you — yes, you – want to have a Chinese language partner — or in her words, "have interesting to do language exchange with chinese friend?" Who is this poor girl with 46 followers? @chinesetutorbei Who are you? — Anthony Tao (@anthonytao) December 28, 2012 We'll let you know when we find out. In the meantime, have a look at the who's who list of people she's tweeted at, which includes Andrew Jacobs of the New York Times, Kelly Dwyer of Yahoo's Ball Don't Lie blog, professional basketball player Maya Moore, and BJC contributor Allie Jaynes: Powered by Wordpress Plugins – Get the full version! (H/T Kevin Collier)

Friday Night Musical Outro: Twinkle Star – The End of the New Beginning Posted: 28 Dec 2012 07:59 AM PST There are lots of New Year's parties and shows in the next few days for those of you in Beijing. The Beijinger has a run-down of where to get down, while Beijing Daze has a list of shows coming up. The band we're featuring here — described by Daze as "the next big band" – will be playing on Tuesday, January 1 at MAO Livehouse, in a lineup that includes Saving Molly, The Lifeless, Disturb the Radio, IBU and New Tank. Enjoy.

The Beijing Ducks Held Their Opponent Without A Field Goal In The Fourth Quarter Tonight Posted: 28 Dec 2012 07:14 AM PST Three quarters down, the Beijing Ducks looked out. Playing at home against the woeful Fujian Sturgeons, a 5-8 team ranked 14th out of 17, the Ducks found themselves inexplicably down nine with 12 minutes to play, a decidedly uninspiring showing from a first-place team that had just notched its signature win of the young season by beating Guangdong on the road on Christmas day. And that's when they woke up. Stephon Marbury scored nine straight points to single-handedly tie the game at 85. Fujian called two timeouts, but the Ducks kept scoring. Wang Zhelin got in the action. Randolph Morris scored four straight. Li Gen threw down a one-handed dunk. And for good measure, with 26 seconds left, Marbury tossed up a long three that hit nothing but net. But it was the Ducks' defense that was more noteworthy. Fujian only scored six points in the final frame, all on free throws. The team somehow managed to miss all its shots from the field. The Ducks turned a nine-point fourth-quarter deficit into a 10-point win, 101-91. Marbury scored 28, while Morris and Li Gen both added 16. Fujian can take solace in the fact that several NBA teams have scored fewer points in a quarter. Those teams at least made a field goal though.

The China MOU (Memorandum of Understanding). Use Them At YOUR Peril. Posted: 28 Dec 2012 05:54 AM PST The other day, Steve and I were emailing with a reporter regarding on how Memoranda of Understanding, commonly called an MOU, are so different in China than in the United States and how that difference often causes early discord between Chinese and American companies. Steve started the discussion by talking about the differences in the meaning of Mermoranda of Understanding (between China (an essentially civil law country) and the United States (a common law country): In the common law tradition like that in the United States, an MOU means little. Only a signed deal really counts. This is not true in the civil law tradition. In the civil law tradition, there is the concept of good faith negotiation. Under that concept, it is not acceptable to simply walk away from an MOU if that would constitute "bad faith." Common law lawyers hate the concept, but it is deeply ingrained into the civil law tradition. In fact, it is a core concept in the Chinese contract law of 1999. Since the traditions are so different, you can see where conflicts may arise. In practice, the Chinese side often will try to turn an MOU into a concrete commitment when it suits them and ignore it when it does not. This is how most people behave and it should be no surprise. The problem is that under Chinese law the Chinese side might be justified in insisting that the MOU is binding if the behavior of the foreign side constitutes bad faith. What is bad faith? The standard example is signing a China MOU and then negotiating with two parties at the same time without informing the two parties and using the MOU to keep one party from taking the initiative on a venture. And then sign a deal with the other party, cutting the first party out of the deal. This sort of strategy is not rare in common law countries, particularly in the mining/minerals and other natural resources businesses. Under the common law, the party cut out under this scenario usually has no claim. Under Chinese law and under civil law, the party that has been cut out has a claim under the bad faith doctrine. Very few common law lawyers are even aware of this issue or they say that the Chinese are "wrong." However, China is a civil law country. It makes no sense to say the Chinese are just wrong. In fact, to the extent that the matter is subject to Chinese law, the Chinese are "right" by definition. I then talked about how this difference in laws can so often lead to problems arising between Chinese and American companies: The impact of this difference is that we frequently see the following: American company comes back from China and shows me their five page MOU and says that they now want to work on a contract .  I tell them that what they have given me is probably a contract.  They tell me that I'm wrong.  I tell them to tell their Chinese counterpart that they now want a contract and see what happens.  Virtually every time, the Chinese company tells the American company that there is no need for a contract and then the American insists that there is and then the Chinese party thinks the American is being a jerk.  The parties have already gotten off on the wrong vote. Steve then summed up the problems: Dan's point is dead on. There is a major gap in legal systems here. It is not culture, it is the legal system itself. Both sides are behaving in a manner completely consistent with their own legal system. But in the end, both sides look to the other as though they are acting in bad faith, when in fact both sides are doing nothing more than trying to reach a deal as best they know how. I then concurred with Steve: Correct.  And the thing is that neither side has malovent intent.  The Chinese side just puts a lot more stock in the MOU than the American side. The American side will sign the MOU thinking its nothing and planning to come back and turn it over to their attorneys to draft the final agreement. And then the problem starts when we tell the American company that the MOU it just signed is almost certainly a legally binding contract and that it is virtually certain that the Chinese side sees it as a contract and that the contract is terrible and that "it needs the following ten things."  The American company then goes back to the Chinese company with the ten things that need to be changed or added and the Chinese company then gets offended because it thought it had a deal and only super minor things needed to be resolved and those would be resolved over time.  So now you have a situation where what could have been a good relationship starts off on the wrong foot or fails to start off at all. Bottom Line: MOUs are different in China and failing to realize this can lead to problems. What do you think?

Friday Links: New subway openings, flattening mountains (hills) again, and pandas playing in the snow Posted: 28 Dec 2012 05:00 AM PST Beijing-Guangzhou high-speed rail, via Sohu With interactive graphics. "Bloomberg News series 'Revolution to Riches' lifts the veil of secrecy on China's princelings, an elite class that has been able to amass wealth and influence because of their bloodline." (Bloomberg) Mountains/hills being moved again. "Yanan, the iconic centre of the Communist Party's revolutionary past, has answered the central government's call for urbanisation by flattening an area of the erosion-prone Loess Plateau almost as large as Hong Kong Island." (SCMP) Look at what Chinese media is reporting: "A man from central China's Anhui Province reported to the police that he was illegally detained for two months after petitioning in Beijing, Beijing News reported Thursday. // Wang Weilong came to Beijing and revealed his grievances to staff with the Supreme People's Court on September 21. However, the next day, he was brought away by several unidentified men at Beijing South Railway Station when he planned to go home. // Wang was detained by unknown men from September 22 to November 18. During the detention, Wang was ironed." (Sina) And: "Local officials in Nanpi county, Hebei Province, Thursday fired a land and resources official after being accused of detaining and attempting to bribe a journalist who was reporting on damage caused to farmland by illegal soil exploitation, the Beijing-based magazine China Newsweek reported Thursday. // The magazine said He Zhiqi, deputy secretary of the CPC Nanpi County Committee visited its office Thursday and told editors that local official Xue Wenyuan's actions were unacceptable." (Global Times) Apple loses again. "A Chinese court has fined Apple Inc 1 million yuan ($160,400) for hosting third-party applications on its App Store that were selling pirated electronic books, the official Xinhua news agency reported on Friday." (Reuters) New subways! "Four new subway lines, including the first phase of Line 6, second phase of Line 10, north section of Line 9 and south section of Line 8, will open to the public on Sunday afternoon, the Legal Mirror reported Thursday." (Global Times) "Scambusters." "Kenny is the founder of International Recovery Service (IRS), an organisation that uses underhand tactics to persuade scammers to repay their victims. Usually this persuasion comes in the form of catching the villain red‑handed and threatening to go public with the evidence of their crime if the client is not repaid." (TimeOut Beijing) Belated, but good. Spoiler: Song Jiaoren is assassinated. "At 10.40pm on March 20th 1913 a young man who represented one possible future for China stood on the platform at Shanghai railway station, waiting with friends to board a train to Beijing. Song Jiaoren—30 years old, sporting a Western suit and a wisp of a moustache—had just brilliantly led his new political party, the Nationalists, to overwhelming success in parliamentary elections, the country's first attempt at democracy after two millennia of imperial rule. He was in line to become China's first democratically elected prime minister, and to help draft a new constitution for the Republic of China." (Economist) Belated, sad. "A minivan carrying 15 children to kindergarten plunged into a roadside pond in a rural area of eastern China on Monday, killing 11 children, state media and an official said." (CBA News) Man trips criminal in Shanghai, via Shanghaiist: Finally… "Freedom of faith" and Auxiliary Bishop Thaddeus Ma Daqin of Shanghai. (UCA News) Pandas playing in the snow. (Sina, below)

China’s ten biggest criminal cases of 2012 Posted: 28 Dec 2012 11:40 AM PST The Qinghai Legal News (青海法制报) from Qinghai province today published the newspaper's editorial selection of China's ten biggest criminal cases of 2012. In a somber tone, the newspaper prefaces its selection with the following summary: This year, all the many public charges that ensued from criminal investigations gave many people a profound impression, leaving in their minds a lingering mark of the criminal cases involved. In the ten criminal cases listed below, there are some people who will never be able to be reunited with their families; there are some people who got rich quick only to have their fake dream world shattered; there was fraud; and there was the question of the safety of the school bus that is still haunting people's consciences….. The people involved in these ten criminal cases in 2012 left behind footsteps that echoed loudly and terrifyingly. The ten biggest criminal cases of 2012 are the following (detailed descriptions follow below): "Sticky Rice" Kang and the massacre of the Chinese sailors (糯康案) The homicide of Bo Gu Kailai and Zhang Xiaojun ((薄谷开来、张晓军故意杀人案) Wu Ying's fund-raising fraud (吴英集资诈骗案) The Gansu school bus accident (甘肃正宁校车事故) The 488 million yuan Sichuan pyramid scheme (四川4.88亿特大传销案) Luoyang sex slaves (洛阳性奴案) Liao Dan and the fake treatment form (廖丹"刻章救妻") "Almighty God" cult "全能神"邪教 Zhou Kehua (周克华案) Mayor of Haitang Bay in Sanya causes loss of 700 million yuan (三亚海棠湾原镇长李骥致国家损失7亿) 1. "Sticky Rice" Kang and the massacre of the Chinese sailors (糯康案) On 6 November, attention was focused on the Intermediate People's Court in Kunming, Yunnan province, where a sentence was about to be read out. The man in the dock was Myanmar national and self-styled criminal overlord of the Mekong river basin, Nuo Kang (糯康), or as some people have called him, "Sticky Rice" Kang (the character Nuo [糯] means sticky rice). Kang and his accomplices had earlier in the year massacred Chinese sailors on the Mekong river, an act so heinous that a joint investigation was launched by police forces from China, Thailand, Laos and Myanmar. There was an outcry in China for the Chinese government to step up protection of Chinese nationals both in and outside the borders of China, and this criminal case was as a result pursued with great vigor by the Chinese police. Sticky Rice got the death penalty. 2. The homicide of Bo Gu Kailai and Zhang Xiaojun (薄谷开来、张晓军故意杀人案) The spectacle of the Bo Gu Kailai (薄谷开来) murder trial occurred in the Hefei (合肥) Intermediate People's Court in Anhui province in August. Bo Gu Kailai and her accomplice Zhang Xiaojun (张晓军) were found guilty of deliberately planning and executing the murder of British businessman Neil Heywood, and Bo Gu herself was stripped of her political rights and given a death sentence with a two-year deferment.  Zhang was sentenced to nine years in jail. Bo Gu and Zhang both declined to appeal. 3. Wu Ying's fund-raising fraud (吴英集资诈骗案) Wu Ying (吴英) was the legal representative of the firm Zhejiang Inherent Quality Holdings Limited (原浙江本色控股集团有限公司) when, in March 2007, she became a suspect in a criminal case of embezzling public funds. In 2009 a court in Zhejiang found that in the period May 2005 to February 2007, Wu Ying used fabricated information and high interest loans to embezzle around 770 million yuan. She was sentenced to death and deprived of her political rights, but she appealed. In January 2012 the court rejected her appeal and affirmed the original sentence. In April, however, the Supreme People's Court of China had not yet authorized the death penalty, and sent the case back to the lower court in Zhejiang, which finally in May deferred the death sentence by two years. A significant factor in Wu Ying's case was an online campaign for her to be spared the death penalty. 4. The Gansu school bus accident (甘肃正宁校车事故) On 16 November 2011, a minibus from the Little Doctor Kindergarten in Shaanxi province (榆林子镇小博士幼儿园) was travelling in Gansu province when it collided head-on with a goods van. The minibus had a capacity of nine people, yet it was crammed with no fewer than 64 children, nineteen of whom died in the accident. 21 people died in total, and 43 others were injured. On 20 July 2012, Li Jun Gang (李军刚) was standing in the dock at the court room in Zhengning county in Gansu province (甘肃正宁). Li was chairman of the board at the kindergarten in Shaanxi province and was held responsible for the great loss of life. He was sentenced to seven years in jail. He appealed the sentence, but subsequently withdrew his appeal. 5.  The 488 million yuan Sichuan pyramid scheme (四川4.88亿特大传销案) In 2009 Chen Li Jun (陈利军) set up the company Sichuan Xingfuyuan Agricultural Development Limited (四川省幸福缘农业开发有限公司) to manufacture nutritional products and to sell certain services. A few months later the company had accumulated 150 million members across China who had invested 488 million yuan in the company. Yet it was one massive pyramid scheme. In June 2012 a court in Sichuan (四川) heard the "multi-level marketing campaign" fraud case. Chen was sentenced to ten years in jail and a fine of five million yuan, while his accomplice Peng Chunqi (彭春棋) was sentenced to five years in jail and a fine of one million yuan. You can still see the company's page on Baidu Baike as if nothing was amiss. 6. Luoyang sex slaves (洛阳性奴案) On 30 November 2012, the Luoyang (洛阳) Intermediate People's Court in Henan province delivered its verdict on Li Hao (李浩), who stood accused of murder, rape, organizing prostitution, detaining people against their will and manufacturing and distributing obscene materials. He got the death penalty. Before passing sentence, the court heard that in August 2009, Li had excavated a burrow underneath the cellar of his house. He then tricked six women into his house, imprisoned them in the burrow, and held them as sex slaves. In 2010, Li murdered one of the women. In March or April 2011, Li uploaded a video on the Internet in which he forced the imprisoned women to perform obscene acts. In June or July of the same year he forced three of the women to kill one of the other imprisoned women. 7. Liao Dan and the fake treatment form (廖丹"刻章救妻") Five years ago, Liao Dan's (廖丹) wife, Du Jinling (杜金领), became ill with uremia and was laid off from her job. Liao Dan had already not been working for ten years, and after six months of expensive dialysis treatment for his wife, Liao Dan decided to take matters into his own hands. He found someone to fake a treatment form for his wife at Beijing Hospital so that his wife would be able to obtain dialysis treatment free of charge. Liao Dan got away with it for a full four years in which he cheated the hospital out of 1.7 million yuan in hospital fees. For his crime, Liao Dan got a lot of sympathy from people online. In December a court in Beijing sentenced him to three years in jail for fraud and an additional fine of 3,000 yuan. 8. "Almighty God" cult ("全能神"邪教) On 30 October a court in Inner Mongolia charged eight people with being members of a cult organization called "Almighty God". On 14 December, the court delivered sentences on the accused  ranging from four years to five years, respectively. 9. Zhou Kehua (周克华案) Zhou Kehua (周克华) was originally from Chongqing (重庆). Ever since 2004 he was on the run and cropped up from time to time in several provinces in China, carrying a gun and using it to commit robberies, murdering six people in the process. In recent years Zhou started gaining wide notoriety in the press for his vile deeds, but he was cornered by the police in Chongqing in August this year and shot dead. 10. Mayor of Haitang Bay in Sanya causes loss of 700 million yuan (三亚海棠湾原镇长李骥致国家损失7亿) Haitang Bay in Sanya, Hainan province (三亚海棠湾) is a scenic holiday spot that has also recently experienced a construction boom. Yet in June 2011, a series of reconstruction compensation irregularities came to light in the area. Only in December 2012 did the Hainan provincial Party disciplinary authorities announce that the mayor of Haitang Bay, Li Ji (李骥) had accepted massive bribes and was responsible for the loss of 700 million yuan. A court in Sanya subsequently sentenced Li to death, but deferred the sentence for two years. Links and sources Qinghai Legal News (青海法制报): 2012十大典型刑事案例

Oops! Woman Accidentally Has Sex With Boyfriend’s Twin, Becomes Pregnant Posted: 28 Dec 2012 03:52 AM PST Try this story on for size and see if you believe it. A woman lives with identical twin guys, Lin Weihao and Lin Weizhuang, one of whom is her boyfriend. In March 2010, after heavy drinking by everyone, she walks into the wrong man's bedroom, i.e. not her boyfriend's. She has sex with him, gets pregnant. The brothers have a falling out — for obvious reasons — and a break-up with the girl ensues. She gives birth. One year later, she dies of cancer, and entrusts the baby to the brothers. But who is the father? A paternity test reveals nothing, since they are identical twins. Story via Sohu, as translated by Sinopathic: Two years passed. In May of 2012, Luo Suhong passed away from terminal lung cancer. According to her last wishes, she entrusted the care of her one year-old child to the Lin brothers. However, the two brothers would each not personally admit to being the father of the child. Recently, the mother of the two Lin brothers discovered the Furong Judicial [Paternity] Appraisal Center at the No. 2 People's Hospital in Hunan province; she wanted to have the two brothers take a paternity test to confirm whom is the biological father. A worker for the [Paternity] Appraisal Center took a hair sample from both Weihao and Weizhuang to test for a biological match with the child. The result shocked everybody: both brothers served as a biological match as the child's father. The twins are identical and conceived from the same egg; as they have the same genes, a paternity test is incapable of determining which of the brothers is the actual biological father of the child. It'd be funny if it weren't so tragic for all parties involved. Woman Mistakenly Conceives Baby with Twin Brother of Boyfriend, New Hilarious Pilot for Sitcom Written (Sinopathic)

Fish auctioned off for 340,000 RMB Posted: 28 Dec 2012 12:00 AM PST Thought 200 RMB for a turbot at your local seafood dive was pricey? At this year's winter fishing festival in Jilin Province, a fish was auctioned off for more than the cost of a car. [ more › ]

Henan official sacked for criticizing tomb demolition campaign Posted: 27 Dec 2012 10:00 PM PST A Henan official has claimed that he was sacked from his post for comments criticizing the province's controversial program of demolishing rural gravesites. [ more › ]

A Chinese Version Of “Cats” Is Currently Playing In Beijing. Whoa Posted: 27 Dec 2012 10:56 PM PST Did you know the musical Cats has a Mandarin version, and is currently in Beijing? It debuted in Shanghai in August before swinging by Guangzhou and Chongqing, and 100 shows later, is now playing at Century Theater in this city. Century Theater's website is terribly shitty, but a representative there told me that the show's Beijing debut was December 21, and the next performance is this Sunday. You won't find it listed on the terribly shitty website though, and calling the ticket office at 6468 6708 apparently doesn't work either, so you'll have to buy tickets at Century Theater's window, which is open during normal business hours. To think of it… a world-class musical like Cats really deserves better than this treatment. I mean, THIS… …should at least get a small banner ad on the website of the theater where it is currently playing, don't you think? Also, this is terrible: Performances will run until February 3, according to CCTV News (you can watch a short clip of the Chinese version of "Memory" via that link). If you prefer to appreciate Cats from the comfort of home, the entire musical, starring Elaine Paige and the original London cast, can be watched on Youku. And here's "Memory" on Youku, with Chinese lyrics:

Choir Bar: Bund-side Single Malts Posted: 27 Dec 2012 10:33 PM PST Date: Dec 15th 2012 2:34p.m. Contributed by: katvelayo

New Internet regulations may require real-name registration to service providers Posted: 27 Dec 2012 10:22 PM PST Via Xinhua: The top legislature on Monday began deliberating a draft decision that will strengthen the protection of personal information online by requiring Internet users to identify themselves to service providers. It's for your own good, people: The move is intended to better protect Internet users' privacy and provide a legal basis for safeguarding online information safety to ensure the healthy and orderly development of the Internet, according to a spokesman for the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress (NPC). No government can protect you if you're anonymous: Li Yuxiao, an expert on Internet management and law studies at the Beijing University of Post and Telecommunications, said it would be "empty talk" to discuss protection rights for individuals under the condition of complete anonymity. Real-name anonymity is the future of the Internet: The identity management policy enables people to "protect their lawful rights by providing real names while building an environment of free exchange under anonymity," Li said. Global Voices has gathered some very smart responses from online users in China. People are wondering out loud whether the new measure is merely to control freedom of speech, while acknowledging it's currently not difficult for officials to track down real identities anyway. Writes @游离的世界已经灰白："The Internet is a sword hanging over the head of officials! Legislation is necessary, but the key is how to deal with both the protection of officials and the protection of citizens' freedom of speech. Which comes the first?" China's top legislature mulls Internet regulatory measures (Xinhua, via Global Voices)

Here Are The Winners Of Global Times’s Tongue Twister Contest Posted: 27 Dec 2012 09:59 PM PST The winners of the Global Times Tongue Twister Contest have been unveiled. Welcome to fame, guys and gals: First Prize: Ngo Thi Xuan, Vietnam Most Pretty Female Contestant: Yan Eying (Chinese name), South Korea Most Handsome Male Contestant: Zheng Shenghuan (Chinese name), South Korea Most Creative Performance: Emily Billiau and Gregory Van Loock, Belgium Most Promising Contestant: Miki Sekiguchi, Japan Stay tuned for Beijing Cream's contest for worst English-speaking laowai. Only requirement is you must have lived in China for at least five years. Prepare your cameras — we'll post an example next week.

Shanghaiist Year in Review: Most popular posts of 2012 Posted: 27 Dec 2012 08:00 PM PST As we prepare to say goodbye to 2012 (and finally forget about the damn Mayans), lets look back at the most popular posts on Shanghaiist in the last year. Looking forward to 2013, here's our guide on how to ring in the new year in style. [ more › ]

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