Links » Crème » Mid-Week Links: Tiananmen Tank Man in 8-bit, Angry Birds not angry at counterfeits, and a gaokao writing contest
Links » Crème » Mid-Week Links: Tiananmen Tank Man in 8-bit, Angry Birds not angry at counterfeits, and a gaokao writing contest |
- Mid-Week Links: Tiananmen Tank Man in 8-bit, Angry Birds not angry at counterfeits, and a gaokao writing contest
- Top Ten Search List (June 27)
- Today’s China Readings June 27, 2012
| Posted: 27 Jun 2012 04:23 AM PDT
We have a busy night of blogging ahead. Get your links reads in quick. Remember RFH's June 13 piece about gaokao? Here's a contest for it: "The following are real questions leaked from this year's gaokao. Pick one (1) and respond to it BY MIDNIGHT, JULY 3 in 400 words or less in snappy, brilliant, offbeat fashion – earnest or funny, snarky or sincere." [Asian American Writers' Workshop] A refreshing approach to counterfeits. "When Peter Vesterbacka visited China last spring, the marketing chief for Rovio, the Finnish firm behind the video game Angry Birds, saw fake Angry Birds products everywhere – and he was happy about it. // 'I realized that China was already happening in a big way for us,' Vesterbacka said in an interview. // 'When you see all these knockoffs, you know that there is a lot of demand.'" [Reuters] "Traitor" treated to lunch. "When Yi Fuxian spoke out against China's one-child policy three years ago, he says local officials in his home town in Hunan called him a 'national traitor.' On his latest visit, they bought him lunch. // 'At first only Chinese peasants were on my side, now an increasing number of Chinese intellectuals are with me,' Yi, 43, now a University of Wisconsin scientist, said in an interview in Beijing. He gave 23 talks at universities and forums in China in May and June opposing the policy." [Bloomberg] Richard Burger reviews James Fallows's China Airborne. "Yes, China Airborne is about aviation in China, how it started, how it has evolved and where it's heading, yet the book transcends its ostensible subject, which Fallows uses as a metaphor for China's evolution in general, for its advancement into the modern era, and all the challenges it faces as it seeks to break away from its role as the maker of goods designed by others to a nation that actually pioneers new technologies." [Peking Duck] Citizen journalists on Sina Weibo break more stories than any Chinese media outlet, in my opinion. "These blogger-activists are far from revolutionary. Like the incoming leaders, many are children of Communist Party officials. They are patriots, but they want the nation's institutions to work better and on behalf of the people. They take on corrupt corporations as much as they do the government. They are just as concerned about kidnapped children and AIDS victims as they are about voting rights and free elections." [Washington Post] This joke got Southern People Weekly reporter Cao Linhua fired, and it's not even funny, or a joke, really. "2 men and 1 woman go to heaven, but what if the latter comes back pregnant? Is this part of the national training for astronauts?" [Global Voices] Have you listened to Evan Osnos on This American Life yet? If not, go do it now. No! Bad! "North Korea has executed four of 44 defectors who were recently repatriated to their home country from China, a civic activist said Monday." [The Korea Herald] General Tsao's chicken recipe interlude: Finally… Baby born without anus to get one, surgically, after family gets 20,000 yuan in public donations. [The Nanfang] Now open: Kunming Changshui International Airport. [Xinhua] Bonzi Wells, playing back in China again, is ejected in first quarter of exhibition game for arguing with ref. [NiuBball] Finally, finally…
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| Posted: 27 Jun 2012 03:32 AM PDT Here's the top ten real-time search list for today, recorded at 1:30PM. 1. 陈佩斯之父病逝Chén Pèisī zhī fù bìngshì – Chen Qiang, a famous actor and pioneer of modern China's film industry, passed away last night in Beijing's Anzhen hospital due to complications related to illness. He was 94. His son Chen Peisi, also a famous actor and comedian, had been caring for his father in the hospital. Here's the story in Chinese. 2. 杰克逊旧居鬼魂 Jiékèxùn jiùjū guǐhùn – "Ghosts in MJ's Old House": Michael Jackson's Ghosts are back, this time not brought to us by the imagination of Stephen King. Today, netizen eyes are directing themselves in droves to news of MJ's haunted mansion, as reports come out that on June 25, the anniversary of Mr. Jackson's death, sounds of music and maybe some dancing were heard coming from somewhere inside his former Los Angeles residence. Some Weibo users (eg. "@linsanity7") are now praying that the deceased King of Pop's soul comes to rest posthaste. Here's the story in Chinese. 3. 男女集体裸晒 nánnǚ jítǐ luǒ shài – "Male and Female Nude Sunbathing Collective": Over the past few days, naked people have been gathering together to sunbathe on a dam in Xinghai, Dalian, as passersby and tourists catch peeps and then head for the hills, horrified. With pictures of the nudists posted online attracting more and more attention, reporters visited the site to find out what all of the hullabaloo was about. One reporter noted, aghast, "Several fishermen were on the east bank. On the west bank, bare-bodied swimmers sat, laid on their stomachs, or laid on their backs. Some…even played poker." Apparently, most were middle-aged men, some were younger boys, and none were women (at least when he arrived). Here's the story in Chinese. 4. 公务员陪酒醉死 gōngwùyuán péijiǔ zuì sǐ – "Civil Servant Drinking Partner Drinks Self to Death": On the night of March 15th, Yin Feiyu, director of the Highway Administration Office of Ji'an, Jiangxi died suddenly due to an alcohol overdose resulting from attempts to keep up with a drinking partner. Months later, the Ji'an Highway Administration paid 750,000 RMB to Yin's family in compensation…leading everyone to believe that Yin had been drinking "on the job," at a work-related banquet. The Highway Administration Office has recently come out to deny any such notion, claiming that the money was given to Yin's family members entirely out of "humanitarian concern"…but out there in the online peanut gallery, the people ain't buying it, some making the point that if this was not in fact compensation for a "work-related casualty," Yin's bosses are by default freely handing out money to a government family while other less fortunate "commoner" patriarchs are being told they will just have to die their own banquet-drinking deaths in vain. Here's the story in Chinese. 5. 南大第一美女 Nándà dìyī měinǚ – Nanjing University junior Li Jiannan—winner of the national university table tennis championship and dubbed "Nanjing U's Number One Beauty"—posted an ad for a bodyguard on her Sina Weibo page last night after she noticed "yet another strange man" stalking her, saying she was willing to pay her future protector a six-digit RMB salary. Some netizens are ridiculing her for thinking she is a big enough deal to need an expensive bodyguard, while others are more interested in discussing ways that young women can better protect themselves from harassment on college campuses. Here's the story in Chinese. 6. 一卡通巨额押金 yī kǎtōng jùé yājīn - The Beijing Municipal Administration and Communications Card (北京市政交通一卡通 Běijīng Shìzhèng jiāotōng Yīkǎtōng), known as "Yikatong" (One-card pass), is a store-value contractless smart card that Beijing residents can use for public transportation, purchases at supermarkets, and movie tickets, among other things. As over 180 million of the cards been issued to date, people have started to wonder where the 20 RMB "deposit" for purchasing the card goes, since no one plans on returning their cards any time soon, as there is no reason to. Here's the story in Chinese. 7. 11年前的爱情约定 11 niánqián de àiqíng yuēdìng – "Eleven Year-Old Love Pact": On June 24th, Hunan TV host Xiao Hai wrote on her Weibo that eleven years ago when a young boy and fan of hers wrote to her asking if she would be his girlfriend, she had replied to him, "Once you graduate from Tsinghua or Peking University and make your first million, then we can talk." According to Xiao Hai, eleven years later, the once young boy has now actually done it, and is back to ask for her hand in girlfriendship. After netizens began encouraging Xiao to make good on her promise, she came forward to clarify in interviews that the young man merely wanted to thank Xiao for motivating him, and has not come to "collect." And she has a boyfriend at the moment anyway. Here's the story in Chinese. 8. 女版药家鑫 nǚbǎn yào jiāxīn – "Female Yao Jiaxin Murder Case": In October 2010, a student at the Xi'an Conservatory of Music named Yao Jiaxin stabbed a woman to death after hitting her with his car, because he saw her memorizing his license plate number. Last week, a speeding female driver in Shandong hit a mother and her four year-old daughter on their electric scooter. She did not stop her car, and instead continued on at full speed, hitting other parked cars along the way. A video was later posted on Youku revealing that when medics came to the scene of the accident, the guilty driver stripped all of her clothes off and lied down on the ground, trying to block the ambulance from entering the residential community where she had hit the two victims, and later grabbed the four year-old girl from the medics and dropped her on the ground. The girl ultimately died from the accident, and the mother is in critical condition but will be saved. The female driver is now being referred to as the "girl version" of Yao Jiaxin. Here's the story in Chinese. 9. 城管脚踩商贩 chéngguǎn jiǎocǎi shāngfàn – There seems to be no end in sight for altercations between "chéngguǎn" (urban management officials) and street vendors, with a Weibo post this morning showing pictures of a chengguan in Nanjing stomping on a defenseless watermelon vendor. In the face of netizen anger, the Nanjing Jianye District Xinglong Street Urban Management Department has told reporters, "This law enforcement officer was not a chengguan; the person pictured here is just an assistant to a chengguan, who merely accidentally stepped on the street vendor." An ensuing tidal wave of Weibo posts indicates that most netizens are seeing this as just a bad excuse. The chengguan-bashing continues. Here's the story in Chinese. 10. 王媞Wáng Tí – Wang Ti and Zhu Shuangshuang are the names of two Beijing con women who have been charged with swindling a total of nearly 55 million RMB from 27 Chinese celebrities—including several Olympic champions—in a massive real-estate scam. Here's the story in Chinese.        |
| Today’s China Readings June 27, 2012 Posted: 26 Jun 2012 05:16 PM PDT At best, the chart shows that China's dollar position has become balanced over the last half year. That the dollars China takes in through exports cover the country's dollar import costs, but that's all. There are no surplus dollars leftover for reinvestment.This, by the way, is how Standard Chartered's analysts interpret the data. They say it's significant because it shows that we are "in a different world than in 2005-11″. At worst, however, the chart implies that the banking sector's dollar purchases could be turning negative on a net basis. That, as a result, the dollars China raises through imports are no longer enough to cover its dollar import costs. That China's corporate sector is experiencing a dollar shortage. Groupon Inc. (GRPN), the biggest daily coupon website, is combining its Gaopeng online-commerce venture in China with FTuan, a company backed by local partner Tencent Holdings Ltd. (700) China's yuan was up against the U.S. dollar late Monday because of heavy demand for the local unit from some big banks, after the dollar rose to a near seven-month high earlier in the session due to the central bank's efforts to guide the Chinese currency lower. In this pivotal year of political leadership transition unfolding in the United States and China, the Committee of 100's Opinion Survey 2012 provides timely insight into American and Chinese attitudes toward each other on high impact issues. This year's survey takes a comparative look at US and Chinese public and elite perceptions based on C-100's mirror surveys conducted by American and Chinese polling firms in 2007 and 2012. In examining and integrating both years' data and findings, C-100 has identified four overarching themes, presented in this executive summary, that characterize American and Chinese perceptions. Trade and economic cooperation between China and North Korea in Huangjinping Island on the Yalu River, which divides the two countries, has been withdrawn due to minimal economic benefit arising from the deal. This is seen as a great blow to poverty-stricken North Korea, reports the Global Times, an English-language newspaper based in China. You've never heard of Irish-born entrepreneur Liam Casey, but you're probably carrying a gadget with parts or accessories made by Casey's manufacturing company, PCH International. A draft proposal to amend China's immigration laws is likely to cut the minimum period foreigners who are working in the country could stay in the country, from previous 180 days to 90 days Then on Monday, this "tweet" from a China-based acquaintance travelling in Italy floated up my computer screen: "China Daily is the only English-language paper available at my hotel in Milan," wrote Jeremy Webb, a well-known public relations consultant and blogger. China's government has responded to a deep economic slowdown with a slew of policy initiatives in recent months that together underline a strategy to spur a recovery, while allowing market forces to play a bigger role in reforming an economy still dominated by the state. Wenzhou has witnessed a worrying resurgence of NPLs, which some fear could become a nationwide problem "I cannot see a bottom in economic growth. The general slowdown trend may not change anytime soon," Shi Xiaomin, vice president of the China Society of Economic Reform, a government think-tank in Beijing, told Reuters. Chinese authorities are forcing back into Myanmar some of the ethnic Kachin refugees who have fled into China trying to escape civil war, and Beijing is denying basic care to many who remain, a human rights group said on Tuesday. a key reason China believes it can act with impunity when it comes to human rights? If this veiled jet really is the F-60 (it could be another airplane or just a large mock up of the F-60), China might be on track to to reveal two new types of stealth fighters in less than two years. Under Editor Wang Xiangwei, a once-revered source of China news started to pull its punches. Macau casino stocks declined in Hong Kong trading amid speculation visa restrictions and limits on some China credit cards are slowing revenue growth in the world's largest gambling hub. The company will focus on the first-tier cities such as Beijing and Shanghai, Chief Executive Officer Michael Good of the New Jersey-based firm said. Sotheby's real estate unit has affiliates in 45 countries and regions, including Japan, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Thailand and Vietnam in Asia. But while keeping bad news under wraps is an obvious priority for Party and government leaders, something we've seen play out for decades in China, there have been slight changes to the tone of media control as well, particularly over the past three to five years.Leaders, particularly at the national level, seem far more sensitive now to the international impact of domestic stories than they have been in the past. And many seem to understand that in this age of rapid, decentralized sharing of information, it is difficult to separate domestic public opinion (and the project of information control) from the issues of foreign news coverage, China's international image and — yes, here comes that magic word now so cherished by Chinese leaders — soft power. According to the post, after Deng Jiyuan, victim Feng Jianmei's husband and father of the aborted fetus, was interviewed by German reporters, the local government was riled up about him exposing the skeleton in the cupboard, and sent people to stage a protest outside Deng's home with huge red banners reading 'Strike Down Traitors with Heavy Hands; Kick Them Out Of Zengjia Township.' Deng was forced to flee his hometown. Starting in July, my coworkers and I will be among the first foreign residents of China asked to contribute to the Chinese social insurance system. Although the law was promulgated last October at the national level, Tianjin, like most major cities, has been slow to implement it locally. In fact, according to people at my company's headquarters in Shanghai, Suzhou is the only other city which has enforced the social insurance law for foreigners working at training centers like mine. For many foreigners working in Shanghai and Beijing the social insurance tax is still something on the horizon. 销售价与量的止跌或回升，都可能使这轮调控与前两次一样，无果而终 http://companies.caixin.com/2012-06-26/100404022.html (来自财新网客户端) been delayed repeatedly, surprised of it finally happens Now, Ting Lu, China economist for Bank of America Merrill Lynch, is out with a note in which he says while China's slowdown has been worse than anticipated, and while "we" have also complained about data quality, "we have some very different views from what the NYT article claims", which "stirred markets today". 2nd one recently On Friday, June 29, the United Nations Security Council will release a report telling us about efforts by the DPRK to obtain weapons and WMD-related items in violation of UNSC sanctions. That's interesting because, according to two Japanese press reports which appeared on June 22, this is the first time since 2010 that China–one of the countries fielding experts to a consulting body to the UNSC Sanctions Committee concerning the DPRK–has permitted the UNSC to release these documents. interesting things seem to going on around attitudes to the politics and law committees |
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