Mad that Youtube is BANNED in China Facebook group seems mostly to be expats, although not completely. It has over 700 members at present.
Archive for the 'News' CategoryPage 2 of 7
If you really cared about emerging Internet practices and their social impact in China, AND if you were trying to keep up with social media, AND if you didn’t have all the time in the world to read blogs, AND if you read Chinese…you might just check out or even subscribe to Chinese venture capitalist and social entrepreneur Isaac Mao’s Twitter stream.
Here’s Joi Ito’s Twitter stream in English, which helps give an idea of how the streams can create a kind of ambient intimacy among users. But Isaac is stepping it up a level, to something that is closer to IM + blog + IRC/BBS. Not only do you find Isaac’s ongoing thoughts throughout the day (such as the recent: What’s up with Air China’s service? The flight attendant on an international flight didn’t know whether the meat in the main meal was pork or chicken, and in the end everyone voted and decided it was chicken LOL), but Isaac is using some very cool little applications like Twitterfeed, which lets you read the RSS feeds he subscribes to (blogs such as mindmeters, Techmeme, and 我blog故我在), and Twitterfox, which lets you view his buddies’ Twitter updates (also known as "Tweets"). You can follow conversations across Twitter, kind of like comments back and forth on a blog or a BBS, but all on one page, and often referencing blog posts, news, and random experiences nearly as they happen.
It starts to feel extraordinarily exponential…people like Isaac are moving fast with this stuff and are creating new virtual experiences and spaces as they go.
The China Media Project, based out of the Hong Kong University, ran a recent blog article called QQ runs interactive feature page on the problem of “fake reporters” in China, which pointed out the wave of innovative news dashboards coming out of Mainland Chinese online news sites.
The screen below, taken from the QQ news page suggested by China Media Project, has a graphic-intensive title (roughly translated as "Uncovering the most fake reporter in history"), below which is a snippet of the latest news.
Then on the left are the previews/summaries of full articles accompanied by the respective photographs, and on the right are some primary sources that give a look inside the "fake reporter’s" world.
Then if you scroll down, there is an reader poll on the right and then a box on the left for reader’s comments (but in a format more reminiscent of BBSs than blog comments).
I find it interesting how they’ve managed to leverage the screen to put up multiple articles, viewpoints and pieces of evidence (rather than the typical one article per page format that most news sites take).
The feature article below, from daqi 大旗, uses a similar two column layout, with previewed articles on the left and reader comments on the right. What they also do is quote an excerpt from Baidu Post (the Baidu all-purpose BBS) as a way of putting up another viewpoint.
Note, however, that these are the dashboard views for feature news items that have had multiple articles written on them. So they do not replace the current single-page articles (which are linked to) but they do augment the currently article-centered news.
An email arrived this morning from IFTF’s Jason Tester with the subject header: "What if France is making a backup copy of itself in China?"
The email contained a link to a post on Super Colossal titled: "China: USB External HD to the French."
The scenario, laid out by Super Colossal, is this:
- In the town of Tianducheng in Zhejiang province, the Chinese people are hard at work replicating French architecture, complete with its own Eiffel Tower clone.
- So the Chinese are copying instead of innovating again, nothing new right?
- But what if France, not China, was responsible for this construction.
- What if France was backing itself up, physically, just in case?
Thanks to Reuters/Aly Song for the great photograph.
People’s Daily Online, English version, announced a new feature last week:
From today, China Forum will publish a question or a topic on the forum
once a week, you are warmly welcomed to give your answers or opinions
or comments. And best messages will be edited and published on our
homepage attached with your registered name. For those non-registered
visitors, your IP will be attached.
Although it doesn’t say WHO gets to choose the question or topic, the first two topics were chosen from registered readers, and were edited and republished under the heading, "Readers Say." The first is on the value of money in daily life; the second expresses quite clearly changing perceptions of the relationship between college education and employment, and is titled, "Graduation Equal to Unemployment?"
I went into university in 1993, from then
I knew I would have a life that I have never wanted, but this is life.
I hadn’t any power to change it. I would study knowledge that I am not
interested in, and went the job I do not favor. But it is the life I
couldn’t change it so I studied hard, worked hard. It is the life and
destiny.
It would be great it they continue to choose the best topics and responses each week; it would be even better if they would offer the same service for Chinese-language forums. Wouldn’t you love a weekly translation of excerpts from the single most popular BBS post on any People’s Daily forum?
Youtube is a forum for independent media that could never get a voice in China. Low cost cut-and-paste TV news clips, with voice-overs and bilingual subtitles, will be an increasingly powerful tool for cross-cultural dialogue. These types of DIY videos will also be rallying points in PRC 外的虚拟中国/Virtual China outside the PRC, for discussions that cannot take place openly online on the mainland, drawing a mix of patriotic zealots of all stripes: American and Chinese, right wing and left wing.
"Child slaves, Shanxi China" is the latest video posted on Youtube by a user named daughterofchina. Her earlier video on environmental conflicts in Wuxi and Xiamen was informative and provocative. "Child slaves," however, which deals with the recent Internet exposure of horrific forced child labor in a brickmaking factory in Shanxi, goes right over the top. If you want a hit of sensational sentimental drama, you’ll find it full force here, with an overwrought, verging-on-tears narrative tone, and also in the news clips of a runaway teenager who had been kidnapped but still didn’t want to return home, but who is convinced to do so by a parent who is looking for her own missing child. There is an Epoch Times kind of a feeling to this particular video.
The comments are a delicious sea of Chinese viewers living outside of China, and Americans arguing about contemporary American politics, with passion, cursing, and inevitable accusations of homosexuality. Selected comments below:
[yimaoyunyun] what I can say, we chinese just can’t fight with government anymore, we deserve torture. we deserve it
[fishhead06] No, you deserve freedom and democracy - the Chinese people need to rise
up and finish what the protesters in Tiannemen Square began.
[denbosz] based on what model? The American system? Where the media is controlled
by five corporations and to be elected people need to raise millions
from special interests to pay for campaigns. Where you can be in a war
where 70% of the population don’t want to be.
[xyzshimizu] actually all chinese are just slaves of commie dictatorship..all
chinese should fight for freedom against 1-party dictatioship. btw Free
Tibet, Free Taiwan, Free inner Mongolia, Free Uyghur!!!
[beefhead1984] free willy!!
[sadcow66] Hi..Well China’s Law Is Far From Perfect And Something Should Be Done
About It Before Its To Late And Many More Children Face This Fate And
They Need To Stop Killing Dogs For Fur And Meat Its Barbaric And
Because Of This A Lot Of People Are Becoming Racist. Thanks
[daughterofchina] I know. But maybe we’re too late already. You can not understand how I
feel. It’s the tragedy of our nation. So, friend, please help us to
spread this. Our voice was suppressed. I used to say that "life is
going on and tmr will be better", but now I feel I can hardly go ahead.
We’re destroying our future. It’s not only the gov to be blamed. We all
chinese are sinners. As for killing dogs, I do apologize. But I am vegetarian.
[beadtj] That is not I mean, general to say, I dont see any difference between
your opinion and CCTVs. you repeat the same story that DongFangShiKong
shows on TV. So, Why do you think, you are critcize the gov and the
CCTV not? How can you declare here CCTV is lying and you are not?
[noolympics] The CCTV never mentioned how uncooperative the local Shanxi government
was. The CCTV never mentioned the possibility of collusion between
local Shanxi government and evil businesses. The CCTV never mentioned
when the entire incident first happened. The CCTV never challenged the
responsibilities of the governments. The CCTV never mentioned that a
lot of Chinese are very disappointed about the CCP as shown on
discussion forums.
[beadtj] That is too much requirements for a CCTV, but all of this can be found
in chinese media (another many CCTVs). Nothing can be hiding if it has
be discovered in china this time. Another big step to a opening country.
[beadtj] You are not only sometimes naive man. what kind of a serious narrator
are you? Trying to mislead the foreigner by translate. Seat by TV
without necessary investigate and copy the text and just read it aloud.
Typical manner from a uneducated chinese.
[Hey Lizzy] Actually the
news were published by a local TV channel, and then was wide spread in
the nation through Internet, TV and other media. The freedown was now
led by the highest level of the government. Although there are still
nearly one thousand of children awaiting to be set free, we are
attempting to search for them. As a Chinese, I don’t want to judge my
country. And pls, don’t judge China from only one video.
[classicieon] It’s true crime and we have to prevent this happened again by chastising these criminals.
Before
thtat, we should let that "noolympics" shut the fuck up, as he insanely
roared me, it’s just likes I slaved those kids in his mind.
[noolympics] For someone who resorts to "barbaric" foul language, instead of
educated human logic, we surely know how reliable he/she is!
classicleon is a classic example of a Chinese communist!
[classicieon] I’m not a communist, even if I am, what’s wrong with that? but why you
care my words too much and keep dreaming about me? even if I don’t know
you. because you are a homosex, you keep thinking the way i am to
fulfil your sexual needs!
Coincidentally, I recently posted on Missing Persons websites–it looks like at least some of the missing younger people are probably in similar situations–kidnapped or tricked into brutal, exploitative work situations.
Danwei and ESWN have great round-ups on unfolding Shanxi forced labor events here and here.
Chinese man. Builds robots. In his backyard. Some walk. Some pour tea. The latest pulls a rickshaw.
His wife of course, prefers that her husband spend her time more productively and make money rather than fidgeting with robots in the middle of the night, and sometimes burning down the house (happened once — didn’t stop him).
Spotted by the BBC, surprisingly enough. If you don’t want to sit through the entire clip, watch the last 30 seconds.
Unfortunately he doesn’t seem to have a DIY/geek community backing him (as he might in the US), especially since he lives in a semi-rural area. This phenomenon is similar to Lyn’s post about the homemade planes, which in the US is backed a small but intense community of "ultralight" enthusiasts. When will the proliferation of the internet in China link up like-minded DIY hobbyists? And what will be the nature of the Chinese DIY community?
Via Suicide Bots.
Thanks to China Digital Times for the link to this rather extraordinary video, posted by someone called daughterofchina, whose producers are using the Internet and Youtube as a means of online environmental activism. It would be nice to know more about who produced it. I searched Yoqoo (which I notice is now calling itself Youku, thank god), Baidu, and Tudou and could not find it on any of these Chinese video sharing sites. It must have been posted there, however, so perhaps it has been deleted?
The video calls attention to water pollution in Wuxi and the protests against the PX chemical factory in Xiamen, the latter which has been blogged in depth on ESWN and Global Voices Online.
You can find a collection of Chinese videos of newscasts on the Wuxi polluted tap water issue here.
We should really start a list of what new services and infrastructure are being promised for Beijing in 2008 Olympics. Here’s an interesting one: live TV coverage on the new subway line. The line:
will have a transmitter every 200 meters that can receive
above-ground TV signals, said Ding Shukui, assistant general manager of
Beijing Railway Construction and Management Co. Ltd….The locomotive and the last carriage on the train will be equipped
with receivers that can transmit signals to the eight liquid crystal TV
sets in each carriage,