Shanghai Eye, wide open, brings you this report from the wild frontiers of the People's Daily:

A DAY IN THE LIFE OF A PEOPLE'S DAILY WEB EDITOR

Monday

9.45am: Start work. Listen to your superior tell you that you have to write 10 articles today.
9.46am: Fill jam jar full of hot water and green tea leaves. Slowly sip.
9.47am-11.30am: Play Freecell.
11.30am-2.00pm: Lunch.
2.00pm: Connect to the internet. Find 10 articles about China, including the one about the funeral of Hong Kong pop diva, Anita Mui. Copy them wholesale and paste them into the People's Daily template. Send them to the website.
2.03pm-4.00pm: Play Minesweeper.
4.00pm: Go home.

Tuesday

9.45am: Start work. Listen to your superior tell you that the article you posted about Anita Mui included the following line: "Mui also was active in charity work. In 1989, she was part of a fund-raising effort for China's pro-democracy student movement, which mainland authorities crushed with a violent crackdown in Beijing's Tiananmen Square."
9.46am: Delete the offending line.
9.47am: Pack your bags. You're fired.
9.50am: Call your 'uncle' and get yourself re-instated
9.55 am: Refill jam jar with hot water.
10.50 am: Attribute story to China Daily, thus absolving yourself of responsibility.  

Here is a screen shot of the deleted post. Thanks to Lang Poisson for sending it to me.

Compare and contrast with the the People's Daily story as it stands now. Click here for the excellent Shanghai Eye's original post.

UPDATE: The China Daily's own website carried the same story for more than 24 hours before the offensive ending to the paragraph was removed. Tianjin blogger Brainysmurf has an posting on the affair here, with references to similar incidents in the past.