Must-read China news by Danwei

An important reason for the fall in translation quality is the tendency for mainland publishers to seek quick profits. Many mainland publishers will leverage the popular works and seek short-term profits. For example, on the occasion of the anniversary of the birth or death of a famous writer, they will publish the person's works. These newly translated works are packaged nicely and the printing is excellent quality, but the quality of the translation do not measure up to the previous translations.

Some of the newly translated works are so poor as to be unreadable -- they were translated by "brute force." One cannot speak of excellence or fluency. Sometimes one cannot even understand the translation.

The deterioration of translation quality is related to the dire situation of the industry for translated works.

Posted by Joel Martinsen at 7:49 PM | Permalink

The concept of the show was fascinating: an exploration by former senior officials, academics, journalists and students of the implications for China of issues brought up in the Rise of the Great Nations, a history series shown on state television last year. But while the discussion during the recording session was wide-ranging and stimulating, the version broadcast offered an object lesson in how the Communist party's pervasive system of media censorship guides and limits public political discourse.

For me, it meant that those of my comments not cut completely were stitched together in ways that robbed them of any political sensitivity and, indeed, of most of whatever significance they might have had.

Posted by Joel Martinsen at 12:13 PM | Permalink

To Ling, 43, who was well-connected in political and business circles in her home district, Qingyuan, was accused of supervising currency transactions worth 4.3 billion yuan ($578 million) going back to 2005.

The arrest, disclosed last week in a report on Chinese television, has thrown a spotlight on the extent of illegal currency flows out of China into Hong Kong. It has also highlighted the difficulty mainland authorities have in restraining investors who clearly want more options than Chinese equity and property markets or low-interest-bearing bank accounts.

Posted by Joel Martinsen at 4:40 PM | Permalink

For two and half years veteran Chinese journalist and former CMP fellow Zhai Minglei (翟明磊) and others went quietly to work on Minjian (民间), China's first magazine telling the stories of grassroots activists working for the betterment of Chinese society. They had no political or financial ambitions, but were driven only, says Zhai, by their belief in the principles of civil society. After cooperating with authorities since July in an effort to save Minjian amidst a government crackdown on "illegal publications", including the China Development Brief, Zhai has decided to speak out in an open letter explaining the circumstances surrounding Minjian's "death."

"Had it not been for Minjian's closure, we would have worked forever in silence," writes Zhai.

"Up to now no formal decision has been rendered concerning how to deal with Minjian, but we have already given up all fantasies [about its future], and as a public intellectual I must raise my own voice."

Posted by Joel Martinsen at 1:39 PM | Permalink

According to the police on the case, Zhou claimed that the healing effect depends on the faith, and giving money is one way of expressing that faith. Many of the victims gave away their last yuan to "Little Goddess" even though their homes were stripped barren. Most of the victims are uneducated peasant women. According to "Little Goddess," one must have total faith in order to be healed. However, it was alright if the family did not know about it. Therefore, many of the victims were secretly buying the medicine behind the backs of their family members.

Posted by Joel Martinsen at 11:32 AM | Permalink

Posted by Joel Martinsen at 11:30 AM | Permalink

Guangzhou International is a private golf club, and in 1996 a membership there ran about $32,000, more money than a poor farm boy could fathom at the time. Being a private club, keeping up appearances was important. And one of the club's rules stated, in no uncertain terms, that employees below a particular level of authority were not allowed to play golf. Zhou, despite overseeing a large portion of the security force (he imported most of them from Guizhou himself), fell below that particular level.

This would prove to be torturous for Zhou. One of his duties was following playing groups around the course, and reporting their whereabouts back to the clubhouse. Zhou had always been athletic, and he loved sports. It was natural that he wanted to give this new activity a try. But he couldn't. For two years, he walked and watched.

Posted by Jeremy Goldkorn at 11:00 AM | Permalink

The story goes like this...about midnight on Sunday there was a sudden loss of power city wide followed by a huge, and yes I do mean it was a "HUGE FILL THE WHOLE SKY HEY WAIT A SEC ARE WE ABOUT TO BE VAPORIZED KINDA FLASH" coming from over the Lu Hui Tou hillside no more than 600 meters from where we were standing on our apartment balcony...a few seconds later we witnessed a giant ball of fire exploding upward, rising into the sky

Posted by Joel Martinsen at 5:39 PM | Permalink

China National Offshore Oil Corp Ltd (CNOOC) is considering buying stakes in offshore Nigeria blocks from Royal Dutch Shell PLC, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing a person familiar with the matter.

The Anglo-Dutch energy firm may sell stakes in two assets as it restructures its Nigeria holdings, the newspaper reported.

Shell said earlier that it expects to sell about nine bln usd in assets this year.

Posted by Jeremy Goldkorn at 11:17 AM | Permalink

The headline reads: "Authoritarian Rule and Dictatorship Will Certainly Fail."

Reading the front page more carefully, the full length of the title actually reads "Authoritarian Rule and Dictatorship Will Certainly Fail: The Information Office of State Council Publishes White Paper, Introducing the Multi-Party System in China." But the editor made the first half of the title particularly large and bold. "Authoritarian Rule and Dictatorship Will Certainly Fail" also directly came from one of the sentences of the White Paper itself, even though this is obviously not what the White Paper really meant to discuss.

Posted by Joel Martinsen at 10:45 AM | Permalink

Recently some foreign correspondents have been detained, harassed and physically roughed up -- two incidents Tuesday alone. The FCCC board thought you'd want to hear about what happened. One of the journalists who experienced problems had not been aware of previous problems in the area; information such as this therefore might help you plan your travels.

Posted by Joel Martinsen at 10:42 AM | Permalink

The focus in the Chinese newspapers ahead of the awards is largely on China's chances, although the global obsession with Hollywood celebs is making increasing inroads into Chinese newspapers and on the tube. Indeed, the fortunes of Steven Spielberg are closely watched, since he is consulting with China's leading helmer Zhang Yimou (who has regularly been churning out Oscar-nominated martial arts costumers) on the opening and closing ceremonies for the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing.

Online it's a different story, as well as on the entertainment TV channels popping up all over the country, such as Enlight Media. Here, the focus is on everything from what the stars will wear on Oscar night to anecdotes about competing films.

Posted by Joel Martinsen at 12:29 AM | Permalink

Shanghai is all industrial wasteland and toxic lakes infested with carrion-eating vermin that somehow got rebranded as a delicacy, probably during one of the many famines. But in Beijing you only need an hour on clear roads and you're back in the dongbei in all its rural, dustbowl splendor. This is fine for me because, as it happens, I like rural dustbowl splendor. There is something about Northeast China that evokes loneliness, resilience and endurance honed in an endless arid wasteland. The ghost of hard times still lingers over these lands.

Posted by Joel Martinsen at 9:34 PM | Permalink

Imprisoned Chinese journalist Li Changqing has been awarded the World Association of Newspapers' annual press freedom prize, the Paris-based organization said Tuesday.

The award marks the second straight year an imprisoned Chinese journalist has won the Golden Pen of Freedom - underscoring China's continuing harsh press restrictions despite the flourishing economy and rapid social change.

Posted by Joel Martinsen at 4:30 PM | Permalink

Hill has had some success with science fiction in the United States, winning second place in the Writers of the Future contest in 1998 and publishing his short fiction in Talebones, Black Gate, Brutarian Quarterly, and Aboriginal SF. However, none of that compares to Hill's success in China. A number of his stories have been published in Science Fiction World, a Chinese magazine with the largest distribution of any SF/F periodical in the world. In addition, one of his stories, an ozone depletion tale called "The Curtain Falls," hit a deep nerve ten years ago with Chinese audiences.

Posted by Joel Martinsen at 2:06 PM | Permalink

Sounds a lot more primitive than the more fully-realized ad exchanges in the U.S., where instant auctions are carried out. There's no indication of that here. And it sounds like there's quite a bit of work invovled on the part of advertisers, who - judging from the description in the release - have to sift through an awful lot of publisher and traffic data to find inventory they want to buy. Exchanges like AdECN or Right Media are quite different: Advertisers need only specify what types of individuals they're trying to reach, and how much they're willing to pay per mil/per click/per action.

Posted by Joel Martinsen at 1:55 PM | Permalink

Shenyang was mobbed today with furious ex-ant farmers, former employees of Yilishen, a media darling and one of China's most well-known brands in the health supplement market, as the company has just closed, taking the huge amounts its peasant-class employees had invested with it. The city's ant farming industry is no stranger to controversy, and neither is the company. Blog posts on the subject were quickly deleted, including most of the ones below, but a larger mass action remains scheduled for November 21.

Posted by Joel Martinsen at 10:03 AM | Permalink

The mandated 58 hours of training involve drilling students to perfect hard tasks such as driving on planks barely wider than the car's wheels. Students have little training on the roads themselves.

Mr. Hessler says the written test's emphasis on bizarre driving conundrums shows China fitting its road rules to its neophyte drivers and traffic, rather than the other way around. The questions in the study book - which cover topics such as what to do if a car breaks down on a train track and the appropriate behavior when passing an elderly person - "didn't teach people how to drive, it taught you how people drove."

Posted by Joel Martinsen at 2:39 PM | Permalink

As of yesterday, Bullog had been closed for a full month (more than two weeks ago we submitted all the required materials to the relevant departments, but it appears that getting a formal ICP certificate may take a bit more time). For a website that has 600,000 daily page-views, and which has started to host commercial advertising, this was a catastrophic blow. Today, urgency has driven us to give an early launch to "Bullog International," which we had originally planned as branch geared toward overseas users (this site will become a multi-lingual version in the near future).

For the time being, the overseas-hosted Bullog International will close all comment functionality (any feedback will be visible to the author only when logged-in), and at the moment there is no new blog registration for new users. We apologize for this and ask for your understanding.

Backups of all articles posted by Bullog bloggers have been saved on our servers; you can be assured that once the ICP certificate is obtained for Bullog's domestic website, they will all be restored.

"Non-BBS" Bullog International URL: http://www.bullogger.com

2007.11.20

Posted by Joel Martinsen at 1:42 PM | Permalink

The raft of foreign media reports, mostly from correspondents who had travelled around the Three Gorges area, spurred Wang Xiaofeng, director of the office of the Three Gorges Project Committee of the State Council, into action to save his face from being lost in the murky depths of the Yangtze. He contacted Xinhua to supply them with "an exclusive interview". The story was written in English with no reference to the gloom and doom that surfaced at the September 25 forum, presumably in the hope a freak memory loss disease would cripple the globe and also tamper with the Xinhua database.

Posted by Joel Martinsen at 12:53 PM | Permalink

The China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC) will be reviewing the domestic IPO plan of Liaoning Publishing and Media Co Ltd on November 20, as the draft prospectus submitted by the Chinese publishing firm did not specify whether its shares will be listed in the Shanghai or Shenzhen bourse.

According to the IPO plans, Liaoning Publishing will be offering up to 140 million A-shares, representing 25.41% of the company's enlarged capital. The funds raised from the offering will be directed towards improving its logistics, expanding its chain of stores, as well as to supplement its working capital.

During the first half of the year, Liaoning Publishing posted operating revenues and net profit amounting to RMB429.54 million and 40.94 million respectively.

Posted by Jeremy Goldkorn at 3:11 PM | Permalink

China's largest exchange may permit companies such as HSBC, Coca-Cola and Siemens - which have large business operations in the country - to trade.

Que Bo, assistant general manager of Shanghai's exchange said it was doing market research on the plan and expected to 'get some results soon'.

Posted by Jeremy Goldkorn at 1:04 PM | Permalink