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Beijing on Friday approved the launch of China’s first gold futures contracts, with simulated trading on the Shanghai Futures Exchange set to begin on Wednesday.
The exchange is expected to begin selling real renminbi-denominated contracts soon after and is preparing for huge demand from the rapidly expanding number of Chinese producers and consumers.
After the forum, one CCTV news magazine program requested clips including sound to use in its coverage of the story two weekends ago, one director of the program tells this reporter. But Xiamen propaganda officials told him the city never aired talkie footage itself and could not provide him any. "He said they didn't really care [about the project] at this point, as long as they don't have to decide."
Now, this reporter is told, the relevant central government departments are orchestrating a face-saving compromise along with company and local government bosses.
Beijing officials say the Olympics will have a lasting and positive environmental legacy on the city. International Olympic Committee officials acknowledge that air quality remains a problem, but they say the air would be far worse without improvements made for the Games. "The general trend is improvement," said Simon Balderstone, an environmental adviser for the I.O.C.
But pollution is expected to remain a major, long-term challenge as Beijing's population may eventually exceed 20 million people. Scientists also say the city will never be able to clean itself up if surrounding industrial provinces are not cleaned up, too.
I rang my friend Victor Koo, former president of Sohu.com and founder and CEO of one of the leading Chinese video sharing sites Youku.com, who told me that this doesn't actually represent a change in policy: "It's really just a formalization of the implementation and application process," he says. "We've already been submitting various information they've asked us for about our legal structure, and about how we operate. From an operational standpoint it doesn't make a difference, but from a regulatory perspective it's going to be similar to when the portals listed."
The Chinese report is from the Oriental Morning Post.What caused Danone's change in attitude? One of two events, or a combination of the two, was most likely behind Danone's decision.
First, when President Sarkozy of France brought up the Danone/Wahaha dispute with President Hu of China in their recent presidential dinner in Beijing, President Hu undoubtedly told him that there was little he or any Chinese official could do as long as the two parties are embroiled in legal proceedings....
Secondly, Danone may have been somewhat unsettled by the recent court decisions that went against the company in China. While Danone has claimed that it was winning in lawsuits outside China, that is not where the real issues lie. Danone's legal actions in the U.S. were designed to gain leverage on the Chinese partner by going after assets that Wahaha or Mr. Zong may have outside China, but they would have done nothing to settle the central causes of the dispute which are in China.
The third paragraph of Thursday's page 1 report, "Mega departments to help improve efficiency", should have read: Zheng also said the government is considering setting up a mega department in the financial sector without giving any details.
Thanks to Reid Barrett for the tip. See also: A curious correction.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?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.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.
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.
A month before the 114th birthday of Chairman Mao Zedong on December 26, a long forgotten photo of Mao with a young girl resurfaced on the Chinese Internet. It generated an instant furor around the girl.
It has been 41 years since then. She was 18 or 19 at the time, a senior student at the girls' school that was attached to Beijing Normal University. On August 18, 1966, she went to Tiananmen, as part of a delegation of Red Guards to be received by Mao. She was given the special honor of placing a Red Guard armband on Mao’s sleeve. As she did this, Mao asked her her name and she told him: Song Binbin. Loosely translated it means "gentle and refined." Mao had told her in a joking way, according to the photographer, that gentle was out, and "Yaowu" was in. "Yaowu" means "seeking armed conflict."
At roughly 3:20 PM, Christmas Eve, I left my apartment at GaoAn Road apartment to go to the post office. But, as I completed the first of seven flights of stairs to the lobby and entrance of my building, I realized that I had forgotten the envelope that I needed to mail. So I backtracked, grabbed the envelope, and began descending, again when, suddenly, just above the fourth floor (I think), I heard a tremendous crash come through the walls of the stairwell. It sounded metallic and fierce, as if scaffolding had fallen.
Seconds later I turned the corner out of the stairwell and saw this wreckage in the front doorway of my building:
China National Petroleum Corp (CNPC), the nation's largest oil producer, plans to build two refineries in Shandong and Yunnan to boost its capacity.
CNPC will build the Shandong project in the coastal city of Weihai, near the Qingdao refinery of the nation's largest refiner Sinopec, a company source told China Daily.
The Yunnan project will be located in Kunming, capital of the province, said the source, who declined to be named.
Each plant will have the capacity to process over 200,000 barrels of crude oil per day, he said.
Weihai has a port; Kunming is in the early stages of becoming the hub of China's land link with Southeast Asia, Burma and India.Following the development of the film/television industry in mainland China, more and more scriptwriters came along. Scriptwriting became an extremely cheap form of labor. Shi Kong also saw that no matter how well he wrote the script and how well the drama series was received, he never got anything more from it. By this time, Shi Kong's fame came from his novels, and the book revenues became his principal source of income.
According to a mainland Chinese media study, the mainland Chinese scriptwriters earn about 5% to 10% of the total budget of a drama series. In Beijing, which is the major center of television and film production in the country, the typical payment to a scriptwriter is around 240,000 yuan. This figure includes certain big productions with tens of millions of yuan in investment. Many scriptwriters are also in this for the fame and not the money.
But more often, the rights of the mainland Chinese scriptwriters are not protected. Sometimes, they do not receive even their most basic payment. For a "veteran scriptwriter" such as Shi Kong, "it was not bad to receive 800,000 yuan." But for the lesser scriptwriters, their livelihoods are worse.
Danone, the French food group, and Wahaha Group of China have agreed a legal ceasefire and return to 'peace talks' for the resolution of one of the most high-profile disputes between a foreign company and a Chinese partner.
The two had exchanged accusations and lawsuits for many months, with the French company accusing its Chinese partner of setting up copycat operations outside the venture, selling soft drinks and other products under the Wahaha brand, which is named after the sound of a laughing child.
The standoff was discussed at the highest political levels last month during a visit by French president Nicolas Sarkozy to China and raised during a dinner hosted by President Hu Jintao. Franck Riboud, Danone chairman, also attended the dinner.
Chinese farmers are finally showing their power, standing up to the sky. Hundreds of thousands of farmers from three different regions publicly announced to the whole nation that they have the right to own their land. Looking back at villagers in Xiaogang (小岗村) who divided their land in the early reform period, that could still be considered kneeling on the ground, an improvement from their previous totally supine position. This time farmers have really stood up, despite the potential high pressure from the government.
A fist-chop in the throat and surveillance by secret police seems to have put a swift end to the career of China's most popular investigative blogger Zhou "Zuola" Shuguang, but judging from his post earlier this month 'Zhou Shuguang's understanding of citizen reporters and citizen media', if you were to ask him: "is citizen journalism dead?", you'd stand a very good chance of being told that bloggers like him can and must "do journalism", and why. Throw in the way he coldly describes personal accounts as sample specimens below, in addition to making a few criticisms and judgments, and you might just leave seeing citizen media as both an art and a science:
Despite momentary disagreements and terse words over exports and the renminbi, many economists believe that China is well on its way to becoming an economic powerhouse on par with the G-7 nations. Although the future tenor of U.S.-China trade relations is likely to include more than a few challenges, Robert J. Barro, senior fellow at the Hoover Institution, takes an optimistic approach: "We should avoid the protectionist policies that now seem so threatening. And we should enjoy the flow of low-priced Chinese imports—this great deal won't last forever."
that's: You've dubbed the film for the Chinese mainland. Tell us more about this decision.
WKW: Norah Jones is dubbed by Dong Jie, Jude Law by Cheng Chen, and David Strathairn is done by Jiang Wen. I thought at first that this could be a bit strange, but after making this version I don't think so anymore. I think this version helps the Chinese viewer get into the film. Now I feel it can be shared. The dubbing methods here still belong to the '60s, like when they dubbed Russian or Yugoslavian films. There isn't a creative process – it's a strict translation. But I believe dubbing should be a creative process. It should be like this the world over. This isn't just a traditional dubbed version; it's more.
The only time, if ever, most non-disabled people will have interaction with a blind person is when they go to get a massage. There are many of the 12.3 million visually impaired or blind people who do have canes, but the number who would dare to venture out alone with a cane is very, very small and of those, almost none are totally blind. I am starting to feel like a broken record, but the article hints at really how useless Ping's guide dog is. The article offers the quote: "'We were not allowed to enter subway stations, buses and sometimes even taxis,' Ping, a torchbearer for the 2008 Olympic Games, said."
More commentary at Beijing Calling.SCMP Group Ltd., publisher of the South China Morning Post newspaper, rose the most in more than four years in Hong Kong after receiving a HK$2.37 billion ($304 million) buyout offer from controlling stockholder Robert Kuok...
...The publisher's stock slumped to record lows last month on concern a government decision to stop requiring companies to publish corporate announcements in newspapers will hurt sales. SCMP profit doubled in the past five years as Hong Kong's economic expansion lifted advertising revenue...
...Kuok, 84, bought a controlling stake in SCMP from media tycoon Rupert Murdoch in 1993. The company's sales declined to HK$1.2 billion last year from HK$2.4 billion in 1997, when the U.K. handed Hong Kong back to China after controlling it for more than 150 years.
Kuok was rated by Forbes Inc. this year as Malaysia's richest man, worth $7.6 billion. He also has interests in property and sugar manufacturing.
The South China Morning Post's audited circulation fell to 102,013 in the second half of 2006, from 104,415 in the first half, according to its annual report published in April. That is just over a quarter of the sales of Chinese-language Oriental Daily News, Hong Kong's best-selling newspaper with a daily circulation of 400,000, according to BNP Paribas.
[Geologist Yong Yang] opened a spreadsheet. On one side was a series of estimates, based on Yong's research, of the volume of water in the Yangtze. On the other side were the official estimates prepared by the government's Yellow River Conservancy Commission. The government data was supposed to be secret, but Yong had obtained it from a network of friends and former colleagues inside the government.
Yong found that the official figures were often "way off." In one section of the river, the government's plans call for diverting between 8 and 9 billion cubic meters of water north each year. However, Yong's research—supported by thirty years' worth of reports from hydrology monitoring stations—indicates that the average annual water flow for that section includes a low estimate of 7 billion cubic meters. This means that when the river flow is low, the government would be hoping to divert an amount of water greater than the total volume in the river. Moreover, no sound engineering plan should call for redirecting all of the water in a river, since downstream communities, including Shanghai, will still depend upon the Yangtze for agriculture, industry, and hydropower.
via Alan Baumler's post at Frog in a Well, which adds some historical perspective. See also: China's pollution goes global in Mother Jones.At the time I thought that I wanted to hold an attitude that we are friends and not enemies. If I have to make a joke, I should be able to. I ignored all the formal rules and regulations of the meeting. Ultimately, I had faith in the quality of the citizens. Most of the citizens are on the same side as the government -- we are all working for Xiamen. Only a small minority want to cause trouble.
Besides, more than 50% of the forum participants were young people who are easily excitable. If the forum was mismanaged, it would only cause resentment.
For each step, we had several proposals to choose from. We consulted the Internet opinion, especially the negative opinions. We disclosed all the details so that no one can complain. Since people accused the government of staging a show, we decided to reveal to them everything that we were doing. For example, the selection of speakers was supposed to be done by adults; since someone said on the Internet that the drawing was fixed, we asked children to draw the numbers. Although there was no reason to draw out all 200 numbers, we drew all 200 numbers sequentially to show that no number had been excluded.
Also from ESWN: The People and Wisdom Changed XiamenRecent buzz in literary and publishing circles has painted this hub, which straddles the East and West, as the coming of age literary centre of Asia. Hong Kong, long obsessed with celebrity gossip and the feng shui of success, is now stepping forward in a very different limelight. The city has an up and coming literary festival, its own literary magazine and recently inaugurated an international prize aimed at boosting the profile of Asian literature.
But despite these nascent stirrings writers here say the cluster of companies that control the global publishing business has been slow rediscovering Asian literary works after the demise of the colonial era. Their pursuit of instantaneous hits has shut many literary gems out of the global market, allowing only a small number of non-English books to enter the inner sanctum of English-language audiences.
Even as interest in original voices from Asia -- a continent still perceived as full of exotic allure in the West -- flares anew, Asian writers are struggling to get their works published and recognised outside of their home countries.
You simply could not make it up. Ten Hollywood screenwriters locked in a closet with a kilo of blow, a brick of twenty dollar bills, your sister and a cigar-smoking chimpanzee in boxer shorts wouldn't come up with this. Even if they weren't on strike. Only China comes up with this. And not only does China alone come up with this, but the story also nicely draws together all the threads of the modern, Chinese narrative and ties them into a pretty bow. Just look at what this story offers: Social Issues...Sex...Corruption...Mass incidents...Ants...The whole thing was harmonized
Since Hu's pronouncements came out last October, we've gotten a glimpse of what the above passage means — basically, more media commercialization under party control. It means the creation of bigger, more powerful, more consolidated Chinese media groups that do the party's bidding, an intensification of Hu's earlier policies of the "Three Closenesses" (三贴近) and "media strengthening" (做强做大).
It was no mere coincidence when GAPP minister Liu Binjie (柳斌杰) announced on October 17 that China would now allow "comprehensive listings" (of both business and editorial sides) by media companies and invite an infusion of capital from major state-owned enterprises. Nor was it a surprise when news followed on November 20 that Liaoning Publishing & Media Company Limited (辽宁出版传媒股份有限公司) had become the first Chinese media company to make a so-called "comprehensive listing."
In 2003, this was, all in all, a very good idea. And, had China decided to maintain the strict quarantine/inspection procedures that it instituted during SARS, that would have been justifiable: protecting China's population from imported disease is in the national interest, under any definition. But, no surprise, as SARS ebbed, so did the strict quarantine procedures, and eventually - say, within a year of SARS - those procedures had been reduced to the quarantine forms. Since then, everybody - including China’s health authorities - has realized that that the quarantine forms are silly. It was just a matter of finding the right excuse to get rid of them.
Before you start griping that blogs are going to take CNN down a peg (and I'm not griping about that at all), consider what it's like when your CNN is CCTV, when your AP is Xinhua. Remember the Chongqing Nail House? Or the PX plant in Xiamen? Not a whole lot of coverage there in China Daily.
Now think about countries that don't even have that much news. Heard much out of Africa lately?
When you actually want to find out in countries that aren't overflowing with media, that don't have 24-hour cable networks following Larry Craig into the bathroom and checking into where Hillary Clinton is getting her campaign money (as they should), places that only make headlines when they get wiped out by tsunamis, who else is out there?
Beijing's plan to invest $5 billion in Morgan Stanley caps a milestone year for China's deal makers: For the first time, Chinese companies and the government bought more overseas than foreign buyers have invested in China.
Chinese buyers have spent $29.2 billion acquiring foreign companies so far this year, while investors from the rest of the world have bought $21.5 billion of Chinese companies, according to Thomson Financial.
The investment in Morgan Stanley will give state-run China Investment Corp. -- a sovereign-wealth fund, essentially the government's money pile -- as much as 9.9% of the Wall Street giant
It is the latest in a string of bailouts of financial giants by foreign investors as the firms struggle with souring mortgage-related investments. Indeed, yesterday Morgan Stanley reported a $9.4 billion write-down for its fiscal fourth quarter on its U.S. subprime and other mortgage investments...
The World Bank has agreed to work with Chinese development bodies on aid programmes in Africa and elsewhere as part of an effort to transform relations with a country that is fast rivalling its influence as a lender.
Robert Zoellick, the World Bank president, said on Tuesday that he had agreed with Li Ruogu, the head of the Ex-Im Bank, a big state-owned lender, to seek joint projects in Africa.
Voracious demand for books and a crackdown on small, polluting paper mills have caused a paper crunch in China, pushing up the price of paper by 10 percent so far this year and forcing printers to delay books and publishers to raise prices.
So far the problems have been largely confined to China, but experts say that if the trend is unchecked, publishers worldwide could find themselves paying higher costs - and consumers facing higher book prices.
Shares in top Chinese milk processor Mengniu Dairy slid nearly 4 percent on Wednesday after France's Danone said it was pulling out of their dairy venture before it had got off the ground, citing slower-than-expected progress.
Danone's pullout raises questions over the French company's other partnerships in China -- a market that yields close to one-10th of its global revenue -- especially after ties with national drinks champion Wahaha soured when the two publicly accused each other of trademark violations.
Danone, the world's largest food and drinks maker, owns more than one-fifth of Huiyuan, China's biggest producer of juice drinks, and has partnerships with several other well-known local firms including Shanghai's Aquarius.
An old friend of mine was recently made director of a county-level environment bureau. He recently paid me a visit and I congratulated him on his appointment, but he simply shook his head and told me he was troubled.
County-level directors, he said, are in a difficult position. In theory, they are subordinate to higher-level environment bureaus, but they are managed by the county Communist Party and government committees, meaning they take orders from local government officials. And while these officials may support environmental protection, they are more worried about GDP, finances and the evaluation of their performance. For instance, generating income from taxes to pay public sector workers such as teachers is accorded a far higher priority than the environment. The local government will often side with polluters, but the environment bureau is supposedly responsible for preventing pollution, so will take the heat for any failure.
I had seen craptaculicious extravaganzas on CCTV of course, and was always struck by how similar they all seemed - the lights, the costumes, the dance spectacles, the music, the Las Vegas cheesiness, everybody smiling so wide you fear they'll get some kind of lip infection.... But seeing it up front was intense. I have to admit, I was mesmerized and in awe; it' so overwhelming, you've little choice but to be in awe - - at least for a while. The performing isn't necessarily bad. In fact, some of the singers were quite talented, and the comedian with the odd bald head with a splotch of hair on the side had an amazing ability to imitate the sounds of animals and whistles of birds.
Compared with Li Xinjun and A Sheng, Li Chenchen seems to be closer to his dream. Like Wang Baoqiang, who was picked for a leading role in Blind Shaft, Li Chenche was chosen by director Jia Zhangke to act as worker "Er Guniang" in his film The World in 2003. But fate seems to favor him less than it does Wang Baoqiang, who later became well-known by A World without Thieves and won even wider praise through Soldier Sortie. The World didn't end Li's wandering life at the studio's gate. Since then, he has only acted as "insignificant characters that did not impress the audience".
I don't like the Regulation getting rid of group renting. Sometimes I just feel helpless and hopeless since I am not a Shanghainese and if there is no cheap, clean and convenient place to live, how could I work here anymore?
Chinese citizens will soon be able to buy shares and mutual funds in London and New York through their local banks after a regulatory reform that marks a further step in the export of Chinese capital into global markets.
A scheme under which Chinese can now legally buy shares in Hong Kong will be extended to include London under an agreement between the China Banking Regulatory Commission and British regulators.
It might still be more difficult than simply walking into a bank and ordering the purchase of shares. Many of the regulations that 'allow Chinese people' to put money somewhere only seem to apply to certain Chinese people.The Zhenghui Clothing Factory is located in Xinhuo village, Sandong Avenue, Huadu district, Guangzhou city. According to the worker named Ah Guo, the company distributed a "VG Company investigative questionnaire" to the workers more than two months ago. There were ten questions with answers listed on this sheet. The workers were ordered to memorize these answers. On payday, the people from the Finance Department and Human Resources Department would go down to the factory floor and quiz the workers. When a worker provides an incorrect answer, his pay would be withheld until he memorizes the answers and passes a re-test. Basically, the workers will not be paid until they get all the answers right. December 5 was payday but many workers have still not gotten their October pay because they gave the wrong answers.
The spokesperson said the State Forestry Administration (SFA) would not "go beyond its position" to evaluate authenticity of these photos. At the end of the press conference, the deputy director of the State Forestry Administration (SFA), Zhu Lieke said: "There are a lot of photographs of the Loch Ness Monster in the museum. People care about the existence of the monster rather than the authenticity of the photos." This response again generated furious criticism from netizens. In one online survey, participated in by 71,000 Internet users, 90% of participants were not satisfied with the government's response.
On December 8th, CCTV's News Investigation program had a full hour program entitled: "Questions on the Photos of the Huanan Tiger." The anchor Chai Jing (柴静) interviewed all related parties and her sharp questions and investigation further revealed the inconsistencies in Zhou Zhenglong's and local officials' denials and obscuring of the truth.
CDT's Fan Linjun translated the following article, by Wang Heyan, from Caijing Magazine on December 11, 2007, which illustrates that the significance of this "Tigergate" event has gone beyond the authenticity of a group of digital photos. Rather, it is a reflection of the existing crisis of public trust in China society.
The trade union representing workers at Hangzhou Wahaha Group has filed a lawsuit against joint venture partner Groupe Danone, claiming that Wahaha's interests have been damaged by the French group's legal actions.
This news comes just after Danone indicated it was willing to retreat:Speaking on Friday, Danone's Asia-Pacific president, Emmanuel Faber, said that the company is willing to suspend all legal moves if the Wahaha Group takes 'concrete action' that would lead to further negotiations on the dispute.
Service positions at Beijing's small restaurants are notorious for their paltry wages and hectic, unfeeling workplace. Offering virtually the same salary and benefits, do foreign food chains really offer a superior alternative to the migrant laborers who wait tables for local restauranteers in Beijing? If you stop to ask the waitress behind the counter, you would probably be surprised to find that the hierarchy and mechanical social environment of these international chains often adds psychological stress, and can be linked to the difference in Chinese emphasis on the collective and Western emphasis on individuality.
Shinan gives us eight choices in a vote for blog story of the year at Bullog, the small but growing blog service provider (BSP) which hosts some of China's most progressive blogger voices, centered around hope to move on from the beating public trust in government and media has taken in recent months.
2007 was Bullog's first full calendar year—if you include the month this autumn it spent 'under reconstruction'—and saw several high-profile personality clashes, three nominees for the Best of the Blogs awards, at least two server blow-outs and, most recently, a move overseas.
China's science and technology is not yet a powerhouse, but American universities and corporations believe that within a quarter of a century it will be. Accordingly, collaboration with Chinese scientists and investments in jointly operated research facilities has been accelerating. Today, there are more than 1,000 foreign-funded R&D centers in China, compared to fewer than than 200 in India. Likewise, universities are scrambling to set up collaborative research labs in China. Georgia Tech was one of the earliest American universities to establish collaborative programs with China. Why should we be collaborating with a potential competitor?
Reports of Beijing hotels ramping up prices for next year's Olympic Games are based on a misunderstanding of Chinese negotiating techniques, an official said on Tuesday...
...'It is a game between the hotel owners and the market,' Penny Xiang, deputy director of Games Services for Beijing Organising Committee (BOCOG), told reporters on Tuesday...
...Xiang said the exorbitant rates are mainly a sales strategy of the hotels and reasonable deals were available if buyers kept haggling.
'As far as I know there are not many hotels that have actually signed contracts with clients, and those that have signed contracts are actually not at very high price,' she said.
...Beijing is expecting 500,000 foreign visitors and more than a million domestic tourists in a daily flow of about 280,000 during the Games.
It's a catchy tune about the vicissitudes of life as a migrant worker in China, featuring many a real migrant worker doing what they do best: take care of children, serve you at restaurants, build your skyscrapers, carry heavy loads of stuff, etc. They tend to smile and look awkward, which is just so cute because it reminds you of what plain, simple. and un-Paris Hilton like these people are. China's migrant workers—compromising their dignity so you don't have to!
Even as Mao's legacy remains an important ideological bargaining chip in leadership circles, it seems — on a preliminary analysis of this recent news wave — that his legacy is now more open to scrutiny.
Have the clouds parted over this erstwhile taboo?
An article in the December issue of China's Literary Circles of Party History (党史文苑), called "The Controversy over Mao's Royalty Millions" (毛泽东亿万稿酬的争议), reported that Mao's royalties, including interest, totaled a staggering 131 million yuan, or roughly 17.6 million U.S. dollars as of May 2001
Over the last three years, three and a half million mobile users have created over 14 million "red" SMS messages ("红段子"), which have been downloaded and passed on over 100 million times, according to this Xinhua article about Guangdong's "red SMS culture" (色短信文化), found via Zhejiang Online. "Healthy" red SMS have been solicited by China Mobile Guangdong for the last three years in an effort to counteract "yellow" SMS (of a sexual nature), "black" SMS (characterized in the article as "malicious satire"), and "gray" SMS (doesn't say what this means). A Xinhua reporter recently went to investigate some of the people who have been creating and circulating the red SMS, to hear their stories and understand what lies behind this "healthy" movement.
Yilishen, which began making ant tonic in 2001, had filed for bankruptcy and was undergoing liquidation, the English-language report on www.china.org.cn said....The chairman of Yilishen, Wang Fengyou, has been arrested on charges of instigating social unrest, the Web site said. He is suspected of paying employees and company executives to organise counter-protests outside government offices....
Underlining the sensitivity of the issue, almost all online discussions about the case have been censored and the Beijing city government has asked lawyers in the capital not to represent any breeders to ensure "political stability", according to a notice on the Web site of the Beijing Municipal Laywers Association (www.bmla.org.cn).
New Oriental (新东方. NYSE:EDU), China's private education behemoth, has rolled out an online Chinese language learning service--TargetChinese. It is a little rough around the edges, but with New Oriental's resources and expertise it should become a major player in the growing Chinese language learning market. We need all the help we can get, as learning Chinese is not without its challenges.
Adele Mao, analyst at Susquehanna Financial Group (SIG) who covers New Oriental, summarizes the new service
'You're from the north? Oh, you guys don't have anything up there. And if you do, you have to take it on the sly. How pitiful. Have a bit of fun in Shanghai, OK?'
A highly investigative report from the Southern Daily in southern China reveals a secret "Chinese express" for the iPhone's 1.3 billion potential fans. Streetloads (quite essentially) of shuihuo, or "illegit goods" versions of the iPhone — the phone being exactly the same as the one the US and Europe gets — are all the rage. Shops line the street, ready to sell the iPhone to those who want Apple's latest-and-greatest gadget.
...So where do they get those iPhones? These phones actually make the cross-pond (as in cross-ocean) trip twice; they're not from the PRC itself (as in it’s not a case of grabbing it straight from the factory). Instead, the phone is sent from the US, decoded, and offered for sale to mainland customers.
Chinese inflation reached an 11-year high of 6.9 per cent in November, a level that will harden Beijing’s resolve to tighten monetary policy and probably further delay energy price reform.
The annual inflation rate, which hit 6.5 per cent in October, is driven primarily by food prices, which rose by 18.2 per cent from a year earlier, mainly because of a shortage of pigs and rising global feed costs.
But underlying inflation was also up to 1.4 per cent from 1.1 per cent in October – the sharpest rise this year – because of higher oil and coal prices. Utility prices, including water, electricity and gas, rose 5.6 per cent.