China's 2008 GDP numbers: good or bad?
China's newspapers framed the 9% GDP growth in 2008 in various ways. The Global Times' perspective is always good for a laugh.
« January 11, 2009 - January 17, 2009 | Main | January 25, 2009 - January 31, 2009 »
January 24, 2009
Israel: a country which deserves our respect
Renmin University professor Zhou Xiaozheng offers his perspectives on Israel in an article that has sparked considerable controversy online.
The bonfire of China's vanities
Pankaj Mishra writes about Yu Hua for the New York Times Magazine.
Chinese seamen win US$10,000 for fighting pirates
From Xinhua:
Nine pirates armed with rocket launchers and heavy machine guns boarded the ship in the Gulf of Aden on Dec. 17. The crew locked themselves in cabins, using fire hoses and self-made firebombs to keep the attackers at bay for six hours.
January 23, 2009
Strange loop
At The National, Alex Pasternak examines CCTV, its new building, and the controversy that surrounds them both.
Persian Xiaozhao: we are in this together
China Digital Times writes about the blog that was shut down and moved, translating one of the posts:
I have carefully gone through the signatures on Charter 08, from the first to the tenth batch, in the hope of finding more familiar names. They will make me feel close. I thought several good friends of mine would have signed their names, but I didn't see them. I was quite disappointed.
Zhejiang courts making a mark on China's IP law
The China Business Law Blog discusses recent IP rulings by courts in Zhejiang:
So, what do all these cases out of Zhejiang mean? Will the Zhejiang courts lead the way for large awards in IP infringement cases in China? So far, we know that three of the cases referred to above have not been reversed/remanded yet, and that means the Zhejiang courts will likely continue to hand out heavy fines for IP infringements. However, as suggested by the American Daily article, the large fines have so far been levied against foreign/Hong Kong defendants, which tends to lead one to conclude that the Zhejiang courts hold foreign IP infringers to a higher standard, thus subjecting them to harsher penalties. We don't know yet, if and when given an opportunity, if the Zhejiang courts will be willing to levy harsh fines against Chinese infringers where the circumstances require as such.
Ai Weiwei on taking individual responsibility
Rebecca MacKinnon interviews Beijing-based artist Ai Weiwei:
Even people in the police, even people who make policy, they are all able to make choices. Otherwise my blog wouldn't survive. There are always people who insist. One person says, "this post has to be deleted," but another says "it's best not to delete it." I believe somebody must have worked to make it happen. So I believe the desire for justice and equality is something that people must have in their own hearts. This isn't something that one person can give to another. This is a right that must be exercised. If you don't exercise your right society will be in a difficult state.
Remembering John DeFrancis
David Moser at the China Beat writes:
Legendary sinologist, linguist and educator John DeFrancis passed away on January 2, 2009 at the age of 97.
For any student of the Chinese language and writing system working in the latter part of the twentieth century, DeFrancis was simply a titan.
Brendan O'Kane also blogs in memory.
Boom in exam cheats battling for China's top jobs
Tania Branigan writes for The Guardian:
Growing competition for jobs in the Chinese civil service appears to have produced a boom in dishonesty, with about 1,000 cheats caught in the national entrance exams this year.
Hundreds of thousands of unemployed graduates seek safe berths in government offices, but their desperation to succeed has led to the highest level of cheating on record, according to the China Daily newspaper.
Tabloid Xinhua
China's National Bureau of Statistics revised its 2007 GDP growth rate from 11.9 to 13 percent. Xinhua's English-language article reports NBS director Ma Jiantang's statements under the headline "China's leading stats boffin defends revision of 2007 GDP figures."
The high price of developing dams
At China Dialogue, Jiang Gaoming describes how economic stimulus initiatives intended to help China weather the current financial crisis are threatening the ecology of southwest China:
A plan for a string of eight dams along Tiger Leaping Gorge was one of the first hydropower projects to attract media attention, and the scheme was abandoned as a result. However, new economic circumstances have led to the project being relaunched upriver under another name: the Longpan dam. The project is essentially the same, and exploratory drilling and infrastructure construction are now taking place.
January 22, 2009
Sanlu former boss gets life
From China Daily:
Tian Wenhua, the former chairwoman and general manager of Sanlu Group, the firm at the center of the tainted milk scandal, received life imprisonment on Thursday in north China's Hebei province.
Spring Festival crosstalk and the reform era
Crosstalk and comic sketches at the Spring Festival Gala are pretty lackluster. Pan Caifu explains that it's because they're expected to be uplifting, not satiric.
Sanlu-related cases verdicts
From Xinhua:
Tian Wenhua, former board chairwoman of the Sanlu Group at the heart of China's tainted milks candal, was sentenced to life in prison by a local court Thursday.
Three other former executives of Sanlu were given between five years and 15 years by the Shijiazhuang Intermediate People's Court.
Show your patriotism through spending
In these lean economic times, it's the patriotic duty of every Chinese citizen to spend money.
China's economy grows 6.8%, slowest pace in 7 years
From Bloomberg:
China's economy expanded at the slowest pace in seven years as the global recession dragged down exports, increasing pressure for more government spending and lower interest rates to buoy growth.
Bill Bishop on markets, journalism, and Twitter
An interview with Bill Bishop, who has been in and out of China for two decades and has worked in interpretation, journalism, stock data, and Twitter-based financial information.
Anti-porn campaign extended to mobile phone messages
From China Daily:
"We will incorporate 'lewd' messages spread via mobile phones into the crackdown," said seven government departments...
Michelle Yeoh: "This is the best phase of my career"
The Chinese Mirror translates an interview that actress Michelle Yeoh did last year with The Bund magazine:
B: In recent years you've steadily sought ways of working again in China, how did you get the idea of starting a film company?
Y: Because we believed it was needed, and was very important. In the future, our movies will all require new actors, new directors, new producers, every link in the production chain will have to be replenished. To make good movies, we have to foster new talents, and that requires a platform, so we decided to do this. If you have a good movie concept, you can't always use Jacky Chan, Jet Li, Andy Lau, Tony Leung Chiu Wai and Maggie Cheung, just recycling a closed circle of a few people. Our film community needs some new friends we can have fun with.
Court to sentence 21 tainted milk defendants today
From China Daily:
The 21 defendants went on trial between December 26 and 31 at the Shijiazhuang court.
The four executives included Tian Wenhua, Sanlu's former board chairwoman and general manager, two former deputy general managers Wang Yuliang and Hang Zhiqi, and a former executive in charge of the company's milk procurement division, Wu Jusheng.
Americans should lower their expectations?
The Peking Order finds a questionable interpretation of Barack Obama's inaugural address in The Beijing News:
On one hand, Obama appealed to citizens to unite and stick to their beliefs. On the other hand, he also required that citizens lower their expectations. He pointed out that the next generation of Americans should lower their expectations.
...
Here, the newly-inaugurated president did not say that anyone should lower their sights. Many Chinese translators - this mistake can be been found all over the Internet - do not seem to grasp that the need to "lower sights" is part of the "nagging fear," something which Obama, given the context of the full speech, went on to explain away as a mistaken fear.
Also, at 51minus1, a mosaic of yesterday's newspaper front pages featuring Obama's inauguration.
January 21, 2009
Another try for a ratings system
Clifford Coonan at Variety reports on a recent proposal by SARFT to implement a film ratings system:
Sarft has filed the final version of the Film Promotion Law that would introduce ratings to the State Council, state media reported, citing a joint seminar for helmers from the Chinese mainland, Taiwan and Hong Kong.
Sarft could not be reached to comment despite numerous calls.
The issue is a hot potato politically and emerges periodically on the agenda, with the ratings system proposal going down in flames weeks later.
Danwei has more on earlier ratings system proposals.
China issues White Paper on National Defense
From Xinhua:
The Information Office of China's State Council on Tuesday issued a white paper titled "China's National Defense in 2008". Following is the full text of the document...
Obama inauguration front pages from Asia
Thomas Crampton assembles newspaper front pages from various Asian countries showing Obama's inauguration as President.
January 20, 2009
Behind the Chinese blogging boom
Kato Yoshikazu writes a column for Oriental Outlook about blogging's relationship with unique characteristics of Chinese society.
Shanxi teens held for ransom in Burma
Dozens of teens from Yuncheng, Shanxi Province, were lured away from home with the promise of lucrative jobs, but were instead held captive in Burma until their families paid 80,000 yuan to release them.
Jim Rogers is still a China bull
From Reuters:
"This is going to be the new centre of the world, not just the financial but the political world," he said at the Asian Financial Forum in Hong Kong.
What does Charter 08 mean?
RConversation analyzes and charts the discussion over the controversial charter.
China blocks 726 porn websites
From China Daily:
China has blocked another 244 porn websites in the last week, bringing the total number of blocked ones to 726 since Jan. 5.
The story behind Zhang Ziyi's beach photos
ESWN translates yWeekend's interview with the American gossip website X17online.com, and the photographer who took the photos.
Israel's women's appearances are not bad
From chinaSMACK, images of Israeli girls with guns and Chinese netizens' reactions.
The media and China's "global influence"
The China Media Project looks at the possibility of a new international news channel that would "enjoy greater freedom of speech from the central authorities" in light of a speech by propaganda chief Li Changchun:
In his December speech commemorating the 50th anniversary of CCTV, Li Changchun outlined the party's strategy to enhance China's global influence, of which the 6.6 billion dollar initiative reported by the SCMP can be seen as an integral first step.
I believe the gist of Li's speech is a kind of global roll-out of what we have elsewhere called CONTROL 2.0 -- that is, a new conception of media control (a "new pattern of public opinion guidance") whereby the focus shifts from passive and reactive censorship to active influence of the agenda (of which censorship is just one component).
January 19, 2009
Heavy fog strands 16,000 in western China
From China Daily:
More than 16,000 passengers were stranded in major airports in west China as thick fog blanketed Sichuan Province and Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region at the weekend.
The Shuangliu International Airport in Chengdu City, capital of Sichuan, was closed Sunday for more than five hours, delaying 121 incoming and outgoing flights. Another four flights were canceled.
Chinese mainland team leaves for Taiwan to handle monk deaths
From People's Daily Online:
A monk from the Nanjing-based Ling Gu Temple in Jiangsu Province is believed to have committed suicide after apparently murdering a fellow monk in a Taiwan hotel in Hsinchu last Wednesday.
China's most wanted
Asia-Pacific editor Rowan Callick writes for The Australian:
The 17 Guantanamo Bay inmates Washington wants to send Australia as it closes down its controversial camp for suspected terrorists are high on China's most-wanted list. They are Uyghurs, members of the nine-million-strong group of Turkic Muslims - some of them sandy-haired and blue-eyed - who live in the arid northwest Chinese region of Xinjiang, which is about the size of Queensland.
Scavenging treasures in a city's disappearing past
At the New York Times, Andrew Jacobs talks to Li Songtang, who runs the Songtangzhai Folk Carving Museum:
Since the 1970s....Mr. Li has been salvaging architectural remnants and stowing them away, sometimes at considerable risk.
Manchu hitching posts. Ornate wooden doorways. A giant granite horse that graced an emperor's palace. These and thousands of other objects fill Mr. Li's warehouse and spill across the grounds of the hospice he runs in Beijing's western suburbs.
Every item has a tale. That Song Dynasty lintel etched with a frenzy of folk scenes? Pulled from a pig sty. The lacquered screen that tells the history of a clan of scholars? Fished from the burn pile.
Marketing The Audacity of Hope in translation
The AFP talks to publisher Han Manchun about the Chinese translation of Barack Obama's second book, now one of "at least ten books on Obama available for sale in China":
When Han devoured the book at the beginning of 2008, Obama was still a candidate in the Democratic Party's primaries, and many expected he would lose to a determined Hillary Clinton.
But the inspired graduate of Tsinghua University's law faculty, in Beijing, was so impressed by what he read that he was certain Obama would win, and that this presented an opportunity in China.