While the Chinese Net Nanny has ensured that accessing Facebook, Twitter, Youtube, and even Danwei is nearly impossible, there is one site that might make you feel lucky to be surfing the web in China: Google.cn.

Following in the steps of Baidu, Google has jumped on the free music bandwagon, offering downloads to users in China only. But Google has avoided the possibility of Baidu-like lawsuits by teaming up with the big record labels that will get a share of the advertising pie. However, this situation is less than ideal for both Google and the record companies. Forbes said the “music industry’s decision to turn over their catalogs in exchange for a share of such a measly new revenue stream illustrates the desperation of record labels in China.” And you can be sure Google is making the move to increase their 29% share of the Chinese market.

Whenever Google does something, they do it big and do it right. Google China offers more than a million songs from both Chinese and foreign artists. Google’s interface looks much better than Baidu’s and is easier to use too. Searching songs on Baidu will bring up a huge list of stuff you don’t want, whereas Google has more relevant search results and displays whole albums that can be added to playlists or downloaded directly. But the best thing about Google’s free downloads is the speed; you can download an album faster than you can find what you’re looking for on Baidu.

Links & Sources:

Google China Music Homepage

New York Times: Google and Music Labels Bet on Downloads in China

Wall Street Journal: Keep An Eye On Baidu’s Competition

According to the China Daily, Yang Zhiguo, a 74 year old man and Lanzhou resident went on a car smashing spree last Thursday after becoming fed up with drivers that plowed through red lights. Yang was later joined by two other men and nearby residents gave the men both bricks and water in a show of support. Mr. Yang had planned a whole week of his brick barrage, but the police picked him up on his first day after damaging over thirty cars with bricks.

After a woman in his community was killed last year in the same busy intersection, he became a champion for road safety. He successfully lobbied local police to put a stoplight in the intersection, but he said drivers just ignored it.

A poll of nearly 400,000 Chinese netizens showed that an overwhelming 80 percent of people supported him in his actions.

Each year, some 75,000 people are killed in traffic accidents in China.

Take that, law breaker!

Supergirl Li Yuchun (李宇春) is taking a Chongqing advertising agency to court over the unauthorized use of her portrait in a One Child Policy poster.

Seen in Shizhu county (石柱县) in Chongqing, the Supergirl’s portrait appears under the slogans “Boys are just as good as girls” and “Girls also continue the family line.” Already seen as sexually ambiguous in the public eye, she has been ridiculed on the web for appearing overly boyish. But as far as whether the ad agency promoting the campaign had malign intentions is being debated on the web. Some think the “designers” purposely put Ms. Li on the poster to poke fun and make some sort of underhanded statement.

But after examining the poster, it seems much more likely that it was the result of hasty photoshop work rather than malicious designers trying to damage the image of Li Yuchun. What the agency should be sued for is their lack of creativity, not image rights infringement.

Links & Sources

• ifeng
• joy.cn

The recently “elected” Mayor Zhou SenFeng of Yi Cheng City in Hubei province has made headlines. He is 29 years-old and was elected by an anonymous ballot during the meeting of the local People’s Congress on 21 June 2009. With a master’s degree in management science and engineering from Tsinghua University, he is the youngest Chinese mayor to date and has created a stir of concern as to whether he is capable of fulfilling his mayoral duties. Moreover, a People’s Daily poll showed that over half of netizens are concerned that China’s youngest mayor is “susceptible to corruption.”

To add to the spectacle, Chinese netizens are up in arms about a photograph where Mr. Zhou’s assistants are holding an umbrella for him while he inspects something. China’s dearest politician, Wen Jiabao, would never have someone else hold his umbrella. Given this comparison, people are even more doubtful about this young mayor.

There is a Chinese saying 不比不知道，一比吓一跳 meaning “If you don’t compare, you’re in the dark; The moment you do, you get a shock.”

Links & Sources:

Youngest Mayor: Please Hold Your Own Umbrella

China News Wrap

Reminiscent of the “Very Yellow, Very Violent” scandal, a Chinese university student named GaoYe was interviewed on CCTV’s Topics in Focus (焦点访谈) about the recent report about Google.cn containing pornographic (”yellow”) pictures and vulgar content. He criticized Google.cn, saying:

我觉得黄色、淫秽信息在网上的毒害特别大，特别是经过像Google的链接，那种毒害特别大。
就我一个同学吧，他以前就是青少年比较好奇这些东西，他就去点那些黄色网站什么的。然后就搞到那段时间心神不宁，然后后来国家打击黄色网站了，他就没上，那段时间就好了。结果后来他又发现通过Google这些用户比较多的搜索引擎可以打开这些网址，然后又进入了这些黄色网站，Google里面的链接特别多，然后就导致他又反复了。
I think that obscene information on the Internet is extremely poisonous, especially on Google.cn. For instance, I have a classmate, who was like every other youth, very curious about such things. He visited those porn sites and lost his mind in it. Later, the government blocked the porn sites and he could not visit them anymore. He felt better after not having access to those sites. However, he used Google.cn’s search engine and he could open those websites again. After using Google.cn he lost his mind in it again.

This would be a typical news story if it weren’t for the fact that web-saavy Chinese used 人肉搜索 (Human Flesh Search) to point out that GaoYe is an intern at the CCTV studios. This raises questions about both the integrity of the already dubious CCTV reporting and Human Flesh Searches; Chinese netizens have even made public searches on GaoYe’s girlfriend.

For a full Human Flesh Search on GaoYe, see this Hudong post.

After a slew of apologies from the 23 year-old bong-ripper, Michael Phelps has made a formal apology to his Chinese fans via home-video (below). Definitely a good PR move, the Chinese media has not hammered Phelps too hard, and in some cases indirectly praised him:

Chinese sports stars are still in the habit of thanking leaders and giving self-criticisms to their coaches. Many of these sports stars think that their wealth and their fans have absolutely no relationship. Thinking about that, the Chinese sports market has a long way to go (from Guangzhou Daily).

It seems China is not used to sports stars apologizing to their fans. But Phelps definitely had a motive in his apology. Apparently, the video had been sent directly from Mazda, the Japanese car manufacturer, to various Chinese websites and news outlets. Just last month, Phelps signed an endorsement with Mazda worth over $1 million to promote Mazda cars after his eight-gold-medal performance at the Beijing Olympics last summer. The New York Times writes that “Phelps’s deal with Mazda is said to be the most lucrative sponsorship deal for a foreigner in China.”

But it’s sad that Phelps has to bend to will of Mazda and Kellogg. I have a feeling that if Phelps could say what he really felt to his fans and critics, he would take another route. He would tell people that though he engaged in an illegal activity and will accept the legal consequences, his country is a hypocrite when it comes to drugs. The drug policies in America are totally out of touch with reality. That, if anything, his use of marijuana is another fine example of how an illegal drug like marijuana is not dangerous and had no ill-effects on a world class athlete and all-around good guy. But the world is not ready for a successful, well-adjusted athlete to be a poster boy for pot. Selling cars will always trump the truth.

Links & Sources:

• Boston Herald
• Guangzhou Daily
• New York Times

I had seen this guy on TV before, but never really noticed exactly what he did until I came upon Crossing the River (guò hé-过河), a musical skit about a woman reluctantly taking her pint-sized suitor named  Gāo fēng (高峰) across the river. Seriously one of the coolest skits I’ve seen, it is a performance style called èr rén zhuàn (二人转), where a man and a woman sing, dance, and have dialogues (which sometimes get a little racy).

Like the 二人转 skit-style, Pan Changjiang originates from Northeast China and has been called the Mr. Bean of China, though far more verbose. He is multi-talented, having been in several feature films and dozens of skits and music videos. He sings and dances well too. The skit 过河 has a fun song and dance (below) where the woman tests 高峰 on his knowledge of farm life to see whether he is suitable for marriage or not. Pan’s character comes up with witty answers to all of the questions, and finally insulting his questioner.

Other good clips of Pan Changjiang:

双簧 (Super funny clip of 赵本山 and 潘长江)

好人好梦 (Pan Changjiang and his daughter sing a duet)

过河 Original version

过河 Flash version

A group of elderly Beijingers were out in front of the Guangdong government office in Beijing protesting their southern compatriots’ cat consumption habits. They held red banners that read: “水煮活猫,” which translates roughly into “poached live cat,” a play on 水煮活鱼. They wept and held photos of cats in cramped up in wooden crates. Pleading the Guangdong officials to tighten up laws on the tabby trade, their protest was not only ineffective, but ridiculous.

There is no doubt that the majority, if not all, of the protestors are hard-core meat eaters. And I would bet that there is a dozen dog hot-pot restaurants in their neighborhood they are not protesting against. How can these hypoctires draw a line between cat meat and dog meat? Seriously, in a city where you can eat donkey, dog, and baby birds, it is unreasonable and illogical to distinguish a moral hierarchy between the furry critters we eat.

If anything, we should choose from one of three (maybe four, if you are one of those wacky vegans) paths of food comsumption. 1) Eat a strictly vegetarian diet. This gives you the moral high-ground to criticize and protest others that participate in the slaughter of animals. 2) Eating the meat of animals that are up to ecologically sustainable standards (grass fed, free range, hormone-free, etc.). 3) Eat anything and everything. This is a slippery slope that gives no moral ground for critisizing or protesting. My guess is that these protesters fall closest to category three, but they will still say things as ridiculous as: “These cats, they are like our children. We can’t let these people do this to them.”

Burn in 地狱, Guangdong cannibals!

A film about Chinese democracy (no, not the new Guns n’ Roses album), Please Vote for Me is a documentary with a  deep look into a 3rd grade class that elects their 班长 (class captain) instead of having the teacher appoint one. The candidates take the whole process very seriously and things get crazy when the parents get involved, who serve as campaign managers for their child’s bid for class monitor.

Check out the clip below or watch the whole film on YouKu.