Danwei Picks is a daily digest of the "From the Web" links found on the Danwei homepage. A feed for the links as they are posted throughout the day is available at Feedsky (in China) or Feedburner (outside China).

China's capitalist counter-revolution: At the Socialist Party Australia website, Vincent Kolo asks, "In China, which class is oppressor and which are oppressed?":

This is gangster capitalism, as brutal and lawless as that in Russia and other parts of the former Soviet Union. The top echelons of the Chinese state, including the central government in Beijing, are now fully integrated into the global capitalist system - through the open door policy that president Hu Jintao describes as the 'cornerstone' of China's economic development. As a result, China has been turned upside down, from one of the most equal societies to one of the most unequal - with a wealth gap greater than in the US, India and Russia. This 'fully capitalist' programme is central to any discussion on the class character of the CCP regime and state.

See also: Recognition of Private Property in China, Bárbara Areal's article for elmilitante.org last May.

Today's air in Beijing: the most polluted this year: From the tbjblog:

According to the State Environmental Protection Administration, the brown haze that descended on our fair city hit a whopping 421 on the Air Pollution Index today. To put that in perspective, on a good day it hovers between 50-150. On a bad day, we're looking at 200 or so.

Today was far worse than the past two days (280 and 269), and beats out the previous high for the year, 5 January, by 100 points (data from Beijing Air blog). See also: What are we breathing? from the Civic China blog.

Pay-TV turns off China football fans: BBC News reports on the dismal performance of pay-per-view Premiership football broadcasts in China:

Top-flight English matches were previously available for free on television and had a potential audience of 30 million.

But that changed when broadcaster WinTV bought the rights to broadcast Premier League games in China for three seasons, starting this year. WinTV now admits it has managed to attract only 20,000 customers willing to pay the 588 yuan (£39; $80) annual fee.

A company spokeswoman said it was proving difficult to persuade Chinese football fans to pay to watch matches that were previously free. "We're just trying to promote this concept, the idea that people should pay for this kind of service. It will take some time," she said.

Man-made consequences for the Xiang River: From The Economic Observer:

Stricken by drought, abuse by industry, and neglect by local government, the once-majestic Xiang River in Hunan province has been reduced to a shadow of its former self. Since November, its water level has dropped to a record low.

Now, some sections of the river in Changsha, Hunan's capital, are nothing more than scattered, turbid puddles. And underneath one Changsha bridge, exposed pillars caked with silt stand awkwardly on a baked riverbed, while a muddy stream oozes lifelessly beneath.